by Gavin Foo
STARLIGHT #2
Writer: Mark Millar
Art: Goran Parlov
Colours: Ive Svorcina
Letterer: Marko Šunjić
Cover: Bill Sienkiewicz
Variant Cover: Goran Parlov
Hopefully, you are one of those people last month who picked up the first issue - if not, you are missing out. Mark Millar has followed it up with an issue that is equally as spectacular.
Last month we saw the establishment of Duke McQueen, an American Air Force pilot who more than a few decades ago, was transported to another world and dimension, Tantalus - and promptly had adventures and saved that world. The issue though, was much about loss as he had just lost his wife, and reflecting upon where his life has taken him. Let it be said that he had a choice to stay but chose to return to his love on earth.
STARLIGHT #2
Writer: Mark Millar
Art: Goran Parlov
Colours: Ive Svorcina
Letterer: Marko Šunjić
Cover: Bill Sienkiewicz
Variant Cover: Goran Parlov
Hopefully, you are one of those people last month who picked up the first issue - if not, you are missing out. Mark Millar has followed it up with an issue that is equally as spectacular.
Last month we saw the establishment of Duke McQueen, an American Air Force pilot who more than a few decades ago, was transported to another world and dimension, Tantalus - and promptly had adventures and saved that world. The issue though, was much about loss as he had just lost his wife, and reflecting upon where his life has taken him. Let it be said that he had a choice to stay but chose to return to his love on earth.
The end of that issue ends with where this one begins - a ship, quite apparently not from earth, arrives at his doorstep. The feel is no longer about endings, but about new beginnings, as the new arrival from Tantalus states that he has come to ask McQueen for help and to return with him. The child-like Krish Moor (who at earth age, is twelve and a half), proceeds to make conversation despite McQueen’s downturn of his proposal, updating him on the status of Tantalus and the threat, the Broteans.
Goran Parlov has created a look that flawlessly transitions from ‘normal’ earth residences to massive alien landscapes. It’s sci-fi without excruciating detail, minimalist yet conveying emotion in every panel through clever facial expressions, body movement and hand gestures. Together with colourist Ive Svorcina, the outcome is something of a fusion of Incal by Moebius and Tintin by Herge, yet still being a creature completely of its own.
Goran Parlov has created a look that flawlessly transitions from ‘normal’ earth residences to massive alien landscapes. It’s sci-fi without excruciating detail, minimalist yet conveying emotion in every panel through clever facial expressions, body movement and hand gestures. Together with colourist Ive Svorcina, the outcome is something of a fusion of Incal by Moebius and Tintin by Herge, yet still being a creature completely of its own.
MOON KNIGHT #2
Writer: Warren Ellis
Art: Declan Shalvey
Colours: Jordie Bellaire
Letterer: Chris Eliopoulos
Variant Cover: Phil Noto
The Moon Knight team continue to push creative boundaries with the second issue, and really shows the many possibilities of what this series could become.
The first notable thing is the construction of the first 8 pages, which each contain 8 panels, showing a moment in 8 different lives in consecutive order. The first few pages were admittedly confusing until I figured out what they were doing. ‘Genius’, I thought. Anyway, the thing I noticed on the very first page being the red overtone in colour of some guy getting sniped in the final panel. Page follows with more information on each character, character in panel 5 is sniped. In place of panel 8 is narration over white. Next page we have panel 2 sniped, narration in panel 5 and blank/white in panel 8 - this goes on until page 8, the final victim. BAM! New York City, enter Moon Knight close up, title logo, birds eye view of the street.
The culmination of all the stories of all 8 lives ended into the cinematic opening of Moon Knight’s entrance took place in 8 pages, that I read over and over again, that also perhaps signifies the personality disorder the title character suffers from, also perhaps the nothingness of death speaking for itself, that in this book white is the new black, that it lets both the dead characters, Moon Knight and the sniper to tell their stories in separate yet one combined tale.
That being only the first 8 pages… it follows with awesome fight scene between the Moon Knight and sniper, in which the last of the puzzle is told in their interaction. The tale ends with the ninth character, who appears in the final page to kill the sniper, also being the last from the group of people who used to be special operations mercenaries, the others killed from earlier, all of whom abandoned the sniper character in some unsaid mission years ago.
This issue is probably the most re-read 22-page comic in a long time for me, the way the layers, context and subtext mesh is simply sublime. For the many ways the title character is unbalanced - Ellis, Shalvey, Bellaire, Eliopoulos and the editing team are bringing forth one of the most balanced comic at present, in terms of just about every category possible.
IMAGE
Black Science #5
Invincible Universe #12
Revival #19
Starlight #2
DARK HORSE
Edgar Allen Poe’s The Premature Burial One-Shot
Lobster Johnson: Get the Lobster #3
Veil #2
Buzzkill [trade paperback]
VERTIGO
Trillium #8
Fairest #25
MARVEL
Magneto #2
Moon Knight #2
X-Men Age of Apocalypse Companion Omnibus [omnibus]
DC
Swamp Thing #30
Superman: Red Son [trade paperback, new edition]
Writer: Warren Ellis
Art: Declan Shalvey
Colours: Jordie Bellaire
Letterer: Chris Eliopoulos
Variant Cover: Phil Noto
The Moon Knight team continue to push creative boundaries with the second issue, and really shows the many possibilities of what this series could become.
The first notable thing is the construction of the first 8 pages, which each contain 8 panels, showing a moment in 8 different lives in consecutive order. The first few pages were admittedly confusing until I figured out what they were doing. ‘Genius’, I thought. Anyway, the thing I noticed on the very first page being the red overtone in colour of some guy getting sniped in the final panel. Page follows with more information on each character, character in panel 5 is sniped. In place of panel 8 is narration over white. Next page we have panel 2 sniped, narration in panel 5 and blank/white in panel 8 - this goes on until page 8, the final victim. BAM! New York City, enter Moon Knight close up, title logo, birds eye view of the street.
The culmination of all the stories of all 8 lives ended into the cinematic opening of Moon Knight’s entrance took place in 8 pages, that I read over and over again, that also perhaps signifies the personality disorder the title character suffers from, also perhaps the nothingness of death speaking for itself, that in this book white is the new black, that it lets both the dead characters, Moon Knight and the sniper to tell their stories in separate yet one combined tale.
That being only the first 8 pages… it follows with awesome fight scene between the Moon Knight and sniper, in which the last of the puzzle is told in their interaction. The tale ends with the ninth character, who appears in the final page to kill the sniper, also being the last from the group of people who used to be special operations mercenaries, the others killed from earlier, all of whom abandoned the sniper character in some unsaid mission years ago.
This issue is probably the most re-read 22-page comic in a long time for me, the way the layers, context and subtext mesh is simply sublime. For the many ways the title character is unbalanced - Ellis, Shalvey, Bellaire, Eliopoulos and the editing team are bringing forth one of the most balanced comic at present, in terms of just about every category possible.
IMAGE
Black Science #5
Invincible Universe #12
Revival #19
Starlight #2
DARK HORSE
Edgar Allen Poe’s The Premature Burial One-Shot
Lobster Johnson: Get the Lobster #3
Veil #2
Buzzkill [trade paperback]
VERTIGO
Trillium #8
Fairest #25
MARVEL
Magneto #2
Moon Knight #2
X-Men Age of Apocalypse Companion Omnibus [omnibus]
DC
Swamp Thing #30
Superman: Red Son [trade paperback, new edition]
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