REVIEW: ‘Ligaya #3′ gives a reality check

Body image is one of the controversial social problems the world has today. Light skin-darkly-tanned skin, thin-obese, short-tall, someone will always have a say about how your body looks. It doesn’t have to be in a form of an insult, sometimes they come from jokes too. From just across the street where you live to live TV shows, someone will always use how someone looks as subject of a joke. Ligaya #3 by writer Addie Onday and artist Faye Bergonia tackles the about how does it feel for them. Is it really just a joke or is it something more to them?

Addie Onday writes a short but definitely significant story that for sure a lot of readers would relate to. Kim Pulag, the protagonist of this issue, gets commented on his weight a lot. Though to those who have seen him regularly don’t react much to it, the people who rarely see him somehow crudely joke about it.  Kim takes it in stride, smiling sheepishly at them but he actually gets hurt inside.

The komiks goes deeper than that, discussing how some people takes these jokes seriously, and how does it affects their daily lives. It’s a relevant issue today as we often see how people easily dismiss these kinds of things. We would hear, “it’s just a joke, don’t take it seriously.” but at the end of the day, we have already hurt their feelings. It reminds you of how human we can all be and not everyone is as strong as we think they are. That though we may have confidence with ourselves, we couldn’t really expect other people to be the same. Everyone is different.

Faye Bergonia’s art was simple and consistent. It gives you a very light feeling despite the main subject of the issue. It didn’t need to be overly detailed to get their point across. The simplicity makes you focus more on their issue at hand which works well with komiks that tackles sensitive issues such as this.

[CHECK OUT… FlipGeeks with Ligaya Komiks’ Addie Onday and Faye Bergonia] 

Though Ligaya #3 is an issue where we get to know more about Kim Pulag along with his dog Buddah, the komiks could be read as a standalone and wouldn’t confuse to new readers who would just pick up this issue. Ligaya #3 is a good read on how society is today. Its a tiny reality check that we all need to hear or read once in a while. We need these small reminders on how we should treat each and everyone.