Cardinal Dagon vol.1
Behemoth Comics 2020
Written by Massimo Rosi
Illustrated by Giuseppe Costablie
Coloured by Renato Stevanato
Lettered by Mattia Gentili
Enter the Cardinal, a scoundrel. He loves women; he sings karaoke, has bad taste and goes around like a gigolo and a dandy. After the death of the Pope, it’s entirely up to him to bring about the ruin of Earth, in his own way of course.
Two things of note, one is that I am one of Massimo’s biggest fans/supporters and two Behemoth is a company on the rise that you need to take notice of. I love the Osiris Path book and I saw their catalogue and knew right away I needed to read and review this one, even before finding out who the creative team was. I just knew based on my limited knowledge of their books that I was sure anything I was to read would be amazing, ps., turns out I was right. I love that Massimo isn’t afraid to take on the Catholic Church in his stories and paint them out to be hypocritical and so much the opposite of what’s advertised. Plus as we all know the devil cannot exist without god and sometimes Jesus so the way that all of this is blended into a story is rather exquisite to see.
I love the way that this is being told. Essentially this is an 80 page giant which is more than okay with me because of how much story we are getting here. How the story & plot development moves ever forward through how we see the sequence of events as well as how the reader learns information is presented phenomenally well. The opening sets the stage and we see the players and what side of the coin they occupy. The character development is startlingly good. I love seeing these characters and each time, in each panel we get to see a little more of them revealed and it’s kind of delicious. The pacing is perfectly done and as it takes us through the pages revealing this world and the twists and turns along the way it is easy to see how all of this works together to create the story’s ebb & flow.
How this book is structured and how we see the layers within the story woven throughout just takes my breath away. If you are looking for something new to read then you need to get this book, it doesn't matter how you just need to get it.
The interior artwork here is gorgeous. I will say that I wish his crotch and penis weren’t blacked out. I mean it’s 2020 and it looks odd to see that section blacked out where it doesn’t fit with the overall way this should be seen. The linework is fantastic and how we see the varying weights are being utilised to bring out the attention to detail is superbly rendered. The way we see backgrounds being utilised here makes me happy but I do wish we’d see more. On a plane with blank backgrounds it doesn’t feel cramped like it should. Otherwise we get some nice depth perception, scale and that overall sense of size and scope to the story. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a really strong eye for storytelling. The colour work is beautifully rendered as well. I like how we see the hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work.
I love when I read a book that I had high hopes for not only met those but exceeded them in ways that I wasn’t aware were possible, yeah this is what makes me happy and excited to read comics. What we see here and what we experience throughout this book is a different kind of adrenaline rush and I cannot stress/recommend or praise this enough.Massimo truly is one of the absolute greatest writers you aren’t aware of, yet.
Behemoth Comics 2020
Written by Massimo Rosi
Illustrated by Giuseppe Costablie
Coloured by Renato Stevanato
Lettered by Mattia Gentili
Enter the Cardinal, a scoundrel. He loves women; he sings karaoke, has bad taste and goes around like a gigolo and a dandy. After the death of the Pope, it’s entirely up to him to bring about the ruin of Earth, in his own way of course.
Two things of note, one is that I am one of Massimo’s biggest fans/supporters and two Behemoth is a company on the rise that you need to take notice of. I love the Osiris Path book and I saw their catalogue and knew right away I needed to read and review this one, even before finding out who the creative team was. I just knew based on my limited knowledge of their books that I was sure anything I was to read would be amazing, ps., turns out I was right. I love that Massimo isn’t afraid to take on the Catholic Church in his stories and paint them out to be hypocritical and so much the opposite of what’s advertised. Plus as we all know the devil cannot exist without god and sometimes Jesus so the way that all of this is blended into a story is rather exquisite to see.
I love the way that this is being told. Essentially this is an 80 page giant which is more than okay with me because of how much story we are getting here. How the story & plot development moves ever forward through how we see the sequence of events as well as how the reader learns information is presented phenomenally well. The opening sets the stage and we see the players and what side of the coin they occupy. The character development is startlingly good. I love seeing these characters and each time, in each panel we get to see a little more of them revealed and it’s kind of delicious. The pacing is perfectly done and as it takes us through the pages revealing this world and the twists and turns along the way it is easy to see how all of this works together to create the story’s ebb & flow.
How this book is structured and how we see the layers within the story woven throughout just takes my breath away. If you are looking for something new to read then you need to get this book, it doesn't matter how you just need to get it.
The interior artwork here is gorgeous. I will say that I wish his crotch and penis weren’t blacked out. I mean it’s 2020 and it looks odd to see that section blacked out where it doesn’t fit with the overall way this should be seen. The linework is fantastic and how we see the varying weights are being utilised to bring out the attention to detail is superbly rendered. The way we see backgrounds being utilised here makes me happy but I do wish we’d see more. On a plane with blank backgrounds it doesn’t feel cramped like it should. Otherwise we get some nice depth perception, scale and that overall sense of size and scope to the story. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a really strong eye for storytelling. The colour work is beautifully rendered as well. I like how we see the hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work.
I love when I read a book that I had high hopes for not only met those but exceeded them in ways that I wasn’t aware were possible, yeah this is what makes me happy and excited to read comics. What we see here and what we experience throughout this book is a different kind of adrenaline rush and I cannot stress/recommend or praise this enough.Massimo truly is one of the absolute greatest writers you aren’t aware of, yet.
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