Sword of Ages #1
IDW Publishing 2017
Created, Written & Illustrated by Gabriel Rodriguez
Coloured by Lovern Kindzierski
Lettered by Robbie Robbins
A young woman will become the first wielder of the most famous sacred weapon of all time to champion for her world's survival, inspiring a legion of heroes to join her struggle against a merciless alien force. The line between science fiction and magic might get fuzzy, but the line between heroes and villains will be drawn in blood.
I understand that with a five issue run some things need to be glossed over in order to tell the fully story. It’s kind of unfortunate really because the opening had me excited to learn what this family was running away from and running towards. The fact that the girl was left with these alien giant cats to be co-raised was baffling without any real explanation. While it’s not unheard of I would’ve liked to see something that explained why that was happening. So for me personally I think things could have been opened better and it we’d just started with her and the old man going to their destination and she remembered what happened to get there that would’ve been a much less aggravating for me.
So once we move past that and we see her in action against slavers on her way to her destination things start looking up. Also the old man and his vision quest makes me wonder a few things because what we see here could be construed in a number of ways. As if he’s there to guide her to her destiny and he’s definitely not what he appears to be. If so then I look forward to seeing his expanded role as things move forward. If not then his visions or trances are the ranting and hallucinations of a very over-inflated ego.
I will say that once the story starts the interest and intrigue factor ramp up. We get to see more of this strange world explored, we’re introduced to new species and hybrids that we can relate to and find familiar and yet unique. I have to say that I find the idea of sword and sorcery handled in this way as again Gabriel takes something expected and flips the script on it. It feels like Tatooine and Dungeons & Dragons somehow merged to create something completely new. Once he gets going I love the way that Gabriel just ploughs forward without looking back.
His interior artwork is utterly fabulous I mean c’mon that floating giant space jellyfish is breathtaking. His eye for storytelling is as good as it’s ever been with the use of page page layouts through their angles and perspective and how he utilises backgrounds. The attention to detail throughout is wonderful to see. The uniqueness of the characters, human, animal and everything in between all have this really good sense of anatomy about them. Nothing feels like a costume or something too far removed from reality there’s a nice tone and feel to it all.
The road, the scenery and the local wildlife the way it all unfolds here is nicely done. There are parts of story, personality, see characterisation, and action that helps us define the roles the characters play. Also there’s a very specific talking creature here that seems to be more common than I has originally realised and I find that intriguingly interesting. I found the whole road trip in this area to be more reminiscent of say Thundarr the Barbarian and there’s something about that I instantly fell in love with.
This isn’t going to be like anything you’ve seen from Gabriel before and I have a feeling it only gets better from here.
IDW Publishing 2017
Created, Written & Illustrated by Gabriel Rodriguez
Coloured by Lovern Kindzierski
Lettered by Robbie Robbins
A young woman will become the first wielder of the most famous sacred weapon of all time to champion for her world's survival, inspiring a legion of heroes to join her struggle against a merciless alien force. The line between science fiction and magic might get fuzzy, but the line between heroes and villains will be drawn in blood.
I understand that with a five issue run some things need to be glossed over in order to tell the fully story. It’s kind of unfortunate really because the opening had me excited to learn what this family was running away from and running towards. The fact that the girl was left with these alien giant cats to be co-raised was baffling without any real explanation. While it’s not unheard of I would’ve liked to see something that explained why that was happening. So for me personally I think things could have been opened better and it we’d just started with her and the old man going to their destination and she remembered what happened to get there that would’ve been a much less aggravating for me.
So once we move past that and we see her in action against slavers on her way to her destination things start looking up. Also the old man and his vision quest makes me wonder a few things because what we see here could be construed in a number of ways. As if he’s there to guide her to her destiny and he’s definitely not what he appears to be. If so then I look forward to seeing his expanded role as things move forward. If not then his visions or trances are the ranting and hallucinations of a very over-inflated ego.
I will say that once the story starts the interest and intrigue factor ramp up. We get to see more of this strange world explored, we’re introduced to new species and hybrids that we can relate to and find familiar and yet unique. I have to say that I find the idea of sword and sorcery handled in this way as again Gabriel takes something expected and flips the script on it. It feels like Tatooine and Dungeons & Dragons somehow merged to create something completely new. Once he gets going I love the way that Gabriel just ploughs forward without looking back.
His interior artwork is utterly fabulous I mean c’mon that floating giant space jellyfish is breathtaking. His eye for storytelling is as good as it’s ever been with the use of page page layouts through their angles and perspective and how he utilises backgrounds. The attention to detail throughout is wonderful to see. The uniqueness of the characters, human, animal and everything in between all have this really good sense of anatomy about them. Nothing feels like a costume or something too far removed from reality there’s a nice tone and feel to it all.
The road, the scenery and the local wildlife the way it all unfolds here is nicely done. There are parts of story, personality, see characterisation, and action that helps us define the roles the characters play. Also there’s a very specific talking creature here that seems to be more common than I has originally realised and I find that intriguingly interesting. I found the whole road trip in this area to be more reminiscent of say Thundarr the Barbarian and there’s something about that I instantly fell in love with.
This isn’t going to be like anything you’ve seen from Gabriel before and I have a feeling it only gets better from here.
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