As a fan of all things Phantom, I was excited to see a graphic novel adaptation. The artwork was, at times, lovely. I’m sure I’ll be adding this to my collection when it’s published.

When I saw this graphic novel I just had to give it a go as I love the musical and have seen it many times. I loved the artwork in the graphic novel but did on occasions find the font difficult to read, I was reading it on my Ipad mini. However, that being said I loved this and will probably buy my own copy as I read it in one go and could not put it down. My thanks to r Diamond Book Distributors and #NetGalley for providing me with an advance reading copy of #ThePhantomoftheOperaTheGraphicNovel

A beautiful graphic novel that gives a face to Leroux' Phantom of the Opera. This graphic novel is a great way for young readers to be introduced to the famous story and for fans of The Phantom of the Opera to see a new side of this beautiful classic. It is a quick read and the art perfectly matches the ambiance of the original novel.

I was fortunate to have seen the musical in Toronto twice. Once in middle school and once in high school. As a choir kid, I performed many of the songs from the musical. And of course, I've seen the most recent American movie adaptation. Reading the graphic novel brings back fond memories. I enjoyed returning to this story.

I read the book ages ago (but don't remember it too well) and have seen multiple versions of the show, plus a few screen adaptations, so when I stumbled across this new graphic novel adaptation, I knew I had to give it a go.

I came away quite pleasantly surprised - despite being only 128 pages long, the author manages to fit in all salient plot points and it never reads hurried despite being somewhat condensed. The art is très Phantom - all gothic dark colours, opulent backgrounds and swirly detail. It's dramatic and gloomy and unsubtle, and thus perfectly suited to the tone of the story. Christine is blonde in this, which may take a bit of getting used to if you're used to the musical's version, which usually casts her brunette. (Personally I preferred it, because the first version I ever saw of Phantom was the 1990 miniseries with Charles Dance and Teri Polo, so blonde Christine was always the "original" to me.)

The story is nothing new, although I did have a giggle and an eyeroll or seven at Raoul's constant entitled whining. Good lord. Poor Christine, all her romantic choices are terrible.

All in all, a very worthy take on a classic. I can't believe it's the first time someone took this on in graphic novel format!

As a nearly life-long fan of the Phantom of the Opera, I have seen, heard, and read as many versions as I can find, so I could not let this one pass me up. Tomi's adaptation is decent (I am not a fan of adaptations) and evokes the same powerful emotions as Leroux's novel. From a narrative standpoint, the book is spot on and enjoyable. However, I was not a fan of the illustrations. The linework, color choices, and overall design felt muddled and conflicting with the story. I have read several POTO graphic novels and this one is my least favorite.

Thank you NetGalley and Diamond Book Distributors for the opportunity to read an advance reading copy.

The graphic novel is very nicely designed and I really liked the pictures!
Every page is nice to look at and makes you want more.
Unfortunately, I didn't like the story that much. I found it very confusing and understood very little. Since I don't know the original story for the graphic novel, I'm very disappointed. I just expected more: more drama, more emotions and more fear. A few more pages would certainly not have hurt the graphic novel.

In summary, it's a nice graphic novel that is nicely designed, but was rather disappointing in terms of content.


German review:
Die Graphic Novel ist sehr schön gestaltet und die Bilder haben mir sehr gut gefallen!
Jede Seite ist schön anzusehen und macht Lust auf mehr.
Die Geschichte hat mir allerdings leider nicht so gut gefallen. Ich fand es sehr verwirrend und habe nur wenig verstanden. Da ich die Originalgeschichte zu der Graphic Novel nicht kenne, bin ich sehr enttäuscht. Ich hatte einfach mehr erwartet: mehr Drama, mehr Gefühle und mehr Angst vor dem Phantom der Oper. Ein paar Seiten mehr hätten der Graphic novel bestimmt nicht geschadet.

Zusammenfassend ist es eine schöne Graphic novel, die schön gestaltet ist, aber inhaltlich eher enttäuschend war.

A beautiful rendition of a classic. The illustrations by Varga Tomi are stunning and bring to life this timeless tale. They make a sometimes confusing original story into something understandable by all. Most changes to the narrative and/or dropping of story points from the original novel by Gaston Leroux fit very well with the story Tomi is telling. He kept the narrative focus on the three leads. A must read for any Phantom of the Opera fan or a great introduction. A nice addition to the ever growing list of Phantom of the Opera adaptations.

Beautiful illustrations with slight tweaks to the classic story, carefully incorporated into a gothic setting. The Phantom himself was a but different but his originality was kept throughout the novel. Bravo Tomi for the effort you took to graph all the characters.

Thank you Varga Tomi, the publisher & Netgalley for the ARC. This is my own honest opinion.

No, your eyes are not deceiving you. This is really happening. There's a graphic novel adaptation of the classic novel, The Phantom of the Opera. Honestly, I almost find it more surprising that it's taken this long!

As a huge fan of The Phantom of the Opera, I knew that I had to give the graphic novel adaptation a try. Going into it, I obviously knew that some changes would arise, as is the case with any adaptation. There simply isn't enough time or space in a graphic novel to fit everything from a complete novel, especially not one such as The Phantom of the Opera.

On the whole, this gothic retelling is everything that I could have ever hoped for. The artwork is beautiful, the changes were made with precision and care. It kept true to the story, and to the core premise. Though with a twist here and there. The most notable twist being the decision to focus more on the horror elements of The Phantom of the Opera.

Oh, and that artwork! It's simply stunning. Every little detail, from the character designs to the backdrops, and everything in between. It all looked so rich and detailed, while leaning towards darker hues of reds. It all was a perfect fit for the time period and theme.

I'll admit some surprise on stylistic decisions made around the Phantom himself. He looks more like a ghoul in this telling...yet that also fits, in it's own way. Honestly, my only critique of the artwork is that I had trouble reading everything. That could just as likely have been a formatting issue for my ARC though, so I would be interested in hearing how it reads in printed format.

Honestly, I am new to this story. I've heard enough references in popular culture but never actually seen the musical or read the book so I went into this graphic novel with little expectation. The cover is what drew me to the book. If that is what the cover looks like, I really wanted to see the inside. It was arresting and intriguing.
As other reviewers have said, the story seems highly condensed and some parts are difficult to follow. However, the broad strikes of the story were there. The emotion of the characters and atmosphere of the illustrations ushered me along and filled in the gaps.
The illustrations are so cleverly done that you can feel the movement. Even the dialogue is placed so that you can hear their tone and even get a sense of the volume of the sounds. In sure this is common in graphic novels, but it felt particularly well done on this one.
There were 2 gaps that really bothered me. In the beginning, the father talks of the angel. But we don't get any explanation of how he knows about the angel. He seems to push his daughter into this bizarre relationship?
And the Persian. He comes out of nowhere. I would have liked some earlier sightings of him and perhaps a question on Raoul's mind.

I thought this was a different Phantom graphic novel that was coming out but it wasn't bad. The artwork is more like the artwork you see in comic books and I give it two thumbs up.

This is a graphic novel adaptation for Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera. In just over 100 pages Tomi managed to adapt and covert the original story pretty religiously. The dark colour palette and eerie illustration style also provided the perfect match for this Gothic story-line. Small portions could prove difficult to follow if you were not well-versed in particulars of the original, but this still remained a brilliant illustrative rendering of one of my favourite classics.

I was actually quite disappointed. Dont get me wrong the story was well thought out. But I didnt enjoy it as much as I thought I would. And I wasnt to impress with the art work as well. I felt it was as exciting as I thought it should.

The cover of this book is gorgeous and I saw the Phantom of the Opera last year and loved the story, so I was excited to read this. For me, this was a good rendition of the story; however, it is a long story, so difficult to make in to 100 pages seamlessly. I do like that there is a lot of dialogue; however, some of the story felt quite rushed with little black text boxes of storyline to speed things up, where I would have preferred a longer book without the plot boxes. I found the art inside good; but not as amazing as the front cover and I was a little upset that they didn't go with the true phantom of the opera mask and went with something scarier. But, it was a quick way to take in the story if it interests you!

I am a sucker for a Phantom themed rendition of anything and this was an absolutely STUNNING experience. The art was beautiful and I cannot express enough how distracted I got from carrying on in order to look at all the beautiful art

As much as I like the musical, I don't think it translates to a graphic novel. Besides not having the magic of Andrew Lloyd Weber's music, I found the art in this very off-putting. It feels very dated, but not dated in the late 1800s/early 1900s sense, dated like superhero comics from the 80s. It just felt very congested and busy.

A fantastic and engaging visual treatment of a classic story — recommended reading for comics enthusiasts. Well illustrated!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this book in exchange for an honest review.

Before I start, one thing must be said, the ebook for this is quite awful, honestly. Very hard to read.

Luckily, the comic was good enough to make me wanna continue, otherwise I most certainly would've DNFD.

“Everything that is underground belongs to him!”

Apologies in advance for making this review more about my first and favourite musical than the graphic novel I just read. It’s just brought back so many wonderful memories!

I first saw ‘The Phantom of the Opera’ in 1992. My school’s music classes were going on an interstate excursion to see the musical and a few of us who weren’t studying music as an elective managed to find a way to tag along. I finally understood why my Nan loved musicals so much.

I was already quite familiar with the Angel of Music because when I stayed with my grandparents my Nan and I would listen to it on repeat (on cassette) while we played cards late at night. My Pop would be trying to sleep in the next room but every time a new song began Nan and I would get up and dance around the room. Poor Pop … Saint that he was, he never once complained. You would have loved my grandparents!

As an adult I got to see ‘Phantom’ again, this time with my mother in 2008. Mum fell in love with it as well and although Nan had died a couple of years beforehand we’re pretty sure she was there too. We had seats directly in front of the orchestra so it was an even bigger buzz when the chandelier flew over our heads!

Although I haven’t read the book (yet!) the graphic novel included many of my favourite scenes from the musical. The Phantom’s face was more skeletal than I had been expecting but it worked. I wasn’t so sure about his red eyes. I expect the detail of some of the darker scenes will be more vivid in print.

Some of the fonts, particularly those used in the letters, were quite difficult to read in the ARC. Hopefully the higher resolution of the published version will render these more legible.

Thank you so much to NetGalley, A Wave Blue World and Diamond Book Distributors for the opportunity to read this graphic novel. I’m rounding up from 3.5 stars.