Pages

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Warlord of Mars #1

Writer:  Arvid Nelson

Artist:  Stephen Sadowski

Dynamite Entertainment

Cover Date:  October 2010

Arvid Nelson's version of the John Carter of Mars story starts before Edgar Rice Burroughs first book.  It is risky adding to a classic story but Nelson does an amazing job of adding to the story.  If I did not know better I would think this was a short story written by Burroughs.  Burroughs spirit lives on in this title.

Nelson does a perfect job of capturing John Carter's personality.  This issue explains why the Apaches were attacking him in the original story.  The first half of the issue sets up John's back story.  The second half shows the story of his soon to be best friend, Tars Tarkas.

Stephen Sadowski is a good artist to have on this title.  He does a good job with the John Carter part of the book but the art really improves to the next level with the Martian sequences.  Some panels reminded me of the work of the great Gil Kane.  Without copying his panels, Sadowski has definitely been inspired by Kane's work in the figures.  The strongest Kane influence I saw was some of the panels with the white apes.  I can't wait to see Sadowski drawing the future issues of this title.

Highly recommended.

4 out of 5 stars.

No comments:

Post a Comment