Action Lab Entertainment 2018
Written & Lettered by Steve Bryant
Illustrated by Ismael Canales
Coloured by Emily Elmer
The first story arc concludes as Athena and the team face off with the Nazis in a hidden temple. What mysteries are contained within the bronze head? Will Athena live long enough to find out?
You know I was thinking about this after I had read it to really absorb it and let what read soak in. I still stand by the Indiana Jones and Laura Croft baby statement but this issue got me thinking of other stories and franchises that I enjoyed immensely as well. Tales of the Gold Monkey and Tia Carrere Relic Hunter those are shows that are more than guilty pleasures they shaped my life in some way, shape or form. They certainly added to my love of history and the treasure real or imagined within them ripe for the finding. Athena lives up to that era with all the searching for treasure, fighting Nazi’s as they look for occult and superstitious object to helm them win the war. That is why it’s exciting it is all fiction based off reality.
Steve is obviously passionate about this series and he should be it’s one of the most all around best series with a female lead, heck any gender lead for that matter out right now. He has a vision for this and the way the book is structured is spectacularly well done as we get all this information, the cliffhanger style ending which isn’t one and a great look see at how Athena thinks. This is nicely put together and the flow from one discovery to the next until the story reaches something akin to a natural stopping point. It has the right amount of real world places, imaginary artefacts and those nifty hidden rooms and places that always pique our curiosity.
Another aspect of this that I really enjoyed here was the whole way sex is dealt with. Athena is modern woman and as such has no problems using all aspects of her to get the most out of life. She really is somewhat more like a man in this regard and while it’s very much today a more accepted notion of behaviour back then it wasn’t. So the dynamic here is sensational to see and that Dez is placed in the more subservient role between them well it’s pretty amazing. Oh and the fact that he actually cares about her well that wasn’t what I was expecting but it’s still nice to see.
Ismael and Emily do some really nice work on the interiors here. From the utilisation of page layouts and how we see the angles and perspectives in the panels we see a splendid eye for storytelling. The attention to detail varies on the scene so the varying weight of the linework comes into play beautifully. There really is some very nice intricate detail I the walls and floors here and the creativity and imagination on display here.
Any time you bring this kind of overall creativity and imagination to an audience they cannot help but to respond to it. While so many are concentrated on the future people forget the past on which the future is actually based. Those who ignore the past are destined to repeat it well let’s hope not but still to see all the awe and wonder of what they are going through is something that gives hope that fighting for the future is worthwhile. This is what the past was all about living in the now and dreaming of a brighter tomorrow.