
Dynamite Entertainment 2020
written by Mark Russell & Bryce Ingman
Illustrated by Craig Rousseau
Coloured by Dearbhla Kelly
Lettered by Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou
In order to become queen, Sonja The Red had to defeat an evil emperor. But that emperor had a son. And that son will do ANYTHING to exact his revenge...even if it means embracing horrible magics he does not understand.
There is nothing than seeing a book that has you excited then reading it and wondering what in god's happened here. There are a lot of different takes on Red Sonja and while the interpretations aren't always going to please everyone this for me felt like a bad Caillou episode. The story is amazing but Craig's style of artwork does not belong. From missing faces, backgrounds and decided lack of intensity this to me is more kids book at the library than it is a comic featuring Red Sonja. I was distracted throughout and I felt like this was going to be a book in the first part until I realised that the entire issue was rendered this way.
I was taken with the opening where we see the Emperor talking to his son about untying the knots. I thought that was a great way to not only keep his child informed, involved and understand the severity of what is happening but to see this kind of vengeance instilled in him was an interesting kind of warped. Then we see the assemblage of characters that he draws around him and I gotta say I was intrigued. Though this children's illustration really distracted from paying too close attention to the story.
This is the shortest review I have ever done. I say this because the story is strong, has some very interesting elements to it and that ending we see is sensational but I can't get past the interiors. I am glad I haven't been to the store to pick this up because now I won't. I have long praised Dynamite and their ability to put creators on the right projects and this time I just don't see the reasoning. This bugged me, when we see this guy with the arrow knocked and we see his hand holding the bow that the hell is that hand, is it a hand? It looks nothing like it should. I got to stop because Craig isn't a bad artist he just isn't the right one for this in my opinion.