Comic Review June 15th 2010

Oh, what a sad week it is. Here I sit, between all of my favorite series' releases, and I have but one book to comment on, the second issue of the Predators, the prequel to the upcoming film.

Predators #2--Dark Horse
Writers--Marc Andreyko, David Lapham
Artists--Guilherme Balbi, Gabriel Guzman

Alright, so I said last week that I wasn't excited after the first issue. Flat, lifeless characters filled the first half, and talky narrations filled every page in both stories. I'm sad to say that nothing has changed, and I already feel that the series will have done all that it can for me by the close of the third issue, and I will be out twelve dollars total by the end of the fourth. Welcome to the Jungle still proves that Andreyko is pulling a paycheck rather than telling a story. Drake is as generic as military characters come, every line streaked with bravado and idiocy so thick that it's hard to take him seriously. The art even suffers this issue, with awkward character models in almost every panel. In A Predatory Life, Royce continues to ramble endlessly about his views on his foes in the jungle and how he maintains who he is in the world. Well, if I hadn't read this in the first issue, I'd continue to be interested. Maintaining character is a good thing, but just rehashing dialogue doesn't make those characters three dimensional. Instead, Royce comes across as a self important jerk more than anything else. Still, the story here is at least more interesting than the former, not relying on the titular monsters to drive the story told. At this point, I don't expect the series to improve. It's a cheap cash-in on a film that I don't expect to be of high quality either. Oh well, I'll continue to do my duty next week, reviewing issue three, and then the fourth in two weeks. At least I will have something to take the taste out of my mouth.

Coming up Friday: It's a toss-up between another Warren Ellis book, Ministry of Space, or the first trade of Fallen Angel from IDW, penned by Peter David. And if time permits, I've got a special surprise for Monday. Stay tuned, folks.

A note:

Looks like I won't be reviewing Ministry of Space. Look for the review of Fallen Angel Vol. 1 tomorrow. Also, I'm still working on the special review on Monday.

3rdstar