Pawn Shop

This quiet, contemplative examination of intertwined lives in New York City resembles the work of Will Eisner. The four stories follow a widower who has moved out of the city, but regularly returns to haunt it after he finds that moving on is much harder than moving out; a nurse making home visits to a man in a coma, trying to make connections in his very small world; an adrift young woman locked in a toxic relationship that is destroying her; and a lonely woman who devoted decades of her own life to someone else’s well-being. At the center is a pawnshop, where various items connected with the characters pass through and end up in other locations. There’s a melancholy to Esposito’s tapestry, but it’s not without hope. Von Gorman’s art is reminiscent of Matt Kindt and depicts characters and surroundings with the right balance of softness and craggy realism. (Dec.)