Lion Forge 2017
Written by Brandon Thomas
Illustrated by Roger Robinson
Coloured by Juan Fernandez
Lettered by Saida Temofonte
Catalyst Prime has begun! One year after "The Event," missing astronaut David Powell has resurfaced! With dangerous new abilities and no memory of the man he once was. While desperately trying to regain his identity David quickly finds himself a man on the run from shadowy forces as well as his forgotten past.
New universe, new heroes and a whole new way to experience things! I’ll say this much it takes some moxie to create a brand new universe from the ground up and it’s a tad daunting to be the first title in said universe. That kind of pressure man it’s tough but Brandon came through with this issue. We are introduced to the concept of what’s going to happen in these pages and provided just enough information to pique the interest and curiosity while leaving a lot of room for exploration.
So this opens up with one of those world saving events, astronauts head to space avert disaster from killer asteroid and come home to die. A year later the story picks up with a group of government types going after an unknown in Argentina. You know it’s a military op or at least a group of former military working for someone else now it soon becomes clear why they are after him as he exhibits superhuman powers. So the mind does race, who is this guy, is he going to be Noble? Is he the guy presumed dead in the opening, why else would we see that and yes there’s another correlating factor.
The interior artwork here is really nice. It’s got a very comic book style appeal and the attention to detail is amazingly good. Love the colouring here too as it’s instrumental in showing us the effect of his power. The use of page layouts utilising angles, perspective and backgrounds (something I appreciate greatly and would like to see more of) help keep the flow of the story moving nicely.
From what I am seeing here I can safely say that this is a very exciting new offering in the world of superheroes. This not only is an effort to create a new universe with new mythology but it also seems to be helping with the issue of diversity in comics. This book right here is a prime example of why it’s time to think beyond the big two and branch out, support the smaller companies who have a tendency to do books that are as exciting, fresh, original and full the qualities people look for.
I like the way the story here is structured, the pacing and the characterisation. It’s strongly written and has that enigmatic quality to it that leaves you with the whole uhm ok what happened I have to come back and find out. There’s absolutely nothing NOT to like about this issue and so much to love so do yourself a solid and check this out!