Reviewer: Chris Delloiacono
Story Title: N/A
Written by: Bruce Jones
Art by: Bart Sears
Colored by: Mike Atiyeh
Lettered by: Pat Brosseau
Editor: Joey Cavalieri
Publisher: DC Comics
The Warlord created by: Mike Grell
This will be my last standard review for the Comics Nexus. That’s not to say I’m leaving the site–far from it in fact. In the next few weeks you’ll notice a lot of changes at the Nexus regarding format, content, and style, especially with regard to reviews. The Warlord #1 claims it’s the start of a “bold new era,” which after reading the comic is a major overstatement. However, coming soon at the Nexus you can be assured our all new era of greatness isn’t a wonk!
Now that the pre-hype is over with, it’s somehow fitting that my last review before the new era is this particular comic book.
I am an unabashed fan of everything to do with DC’s previous Warlord series. I own every single appearance by Travis Morgan, the titular Warlord, and his entire supporting cast. The Warlord as written and drawn by Mike Grell can be compared with little else, in my opinion. The storytelling, artwork, and characterization are some of the best ever conceived. Once Mike Grell left the character the series drifted slowly downward, yet the book was still entertaining and amazingly it continued for approximately sixty more issues. Cancelled in 1987, the Warlord only made a couple of dozen appearances in the nearly twenty years since. It was about bloody well time the character returned to glory.
After reading the first issue, it still is!
The Warlord #1 as created by Bruce Jones and Bart Sears isn’t a terrible comic, but it doesn’t appear to be the beginning of anything special either.
Let’s start with Bruce Jones’s script. This is a reboot with most of the important bits retained from the classic stories. Pilot Travis Morgan, the future Warlord, crash lands in a fantastical world called Skartaris, just as the previous incarnation did. I give Bruce Jones special credit for getting Morgan deeply involved in the fantasy world in the first issue and not dragging this out Ultimate Spider-Man style.
Jones also introduces us to Tara, Princess of Shamballah, also pulled right from the classic stories. In the old stories Tara became Morgan’s lover and later his wife. This path seems destined to be repeated here as well.
The major change from the original series comes in the guise of the Kolosin Prince Brovis. Brovis has the boot heel of his more powerful kingdom pushing down on Shamballah. A concurrent storyline features Brovis engaging in gladiatorial battle with some of Shamballa’s best warriors, including Tara’s lover, Jhan. Brovis, like his kingdom, is far superior to the foes he faces. He kills them all, including Jhan.
Tara hopes to fight off Brovis’s advances, but only a savior from beyond is capable of saving Tara and her kingdom. Guess who that will be, folks?
Again, I’ll compliment Jones for keeping the action moving rather quickly. We are left with a cliffhanger as the issue draws to a close that promises a confrontation between Brovis and Travis.
Jones pulls various pieces from the Mike Grell creation, assembles them within these pages, and sprinkles in plenty of foreshadowing. The unfortunate thing being, he seems to be taking the paint by numbers approach. There appears to be little doubt of what’s to come and that’s not a great sign for new or old readers. The original Warlord run, even after Grell’s departure, was always predicated on the maxim “Expect the Unexpected,” this series, at least after the first issue, seems only to be built on the expected. That’s not going to garner much readership in the crowded, crossover wasteland currently in comic shops.
Artwork is the type of thing that can make or break a series like The Warlord. We’re talking about an amazing fantasy world of sword & sorcery inhabited by giant serpents, dinosaurs, and armored warriors. Somehow, Bart Sears has made the place look boring. In fact, I’m amazed at how lackluster the artwork was. Sears knocked my socks off with his work in the past, especially his lengthy run on Justice League: Europe back in the 1980s. Those books were full of action, fantastic characters, and cool locations. Not so now.
Sears relies on far too many tight shots, and an overuse of silhouettes in his sequentials. There are only two wide angle shots that show off Skartaris, and they’re pretty bland. I felt no wonder, little awe, and exhilaration was sparsely available on these twenty-two pages. Bruce Jones’s script wasn’t a masterpiece, but with more pizzazz in its rendering it could have succeeded as an introduction to Travis Morgan’s adventures. These interiors aren’t going to make too many readers journey to this seemingly hoo-hum place on a monthly basis.
Better comic books than this have fallen through the cracks of a difficult marketplace. Bruce Jones and Bart Sears better have plans to knock the armor off an army of hard to please comic fans in the next few months or the “bold new era of sword & sorcery excitement” touted on the cover of The Warlord #1 is going to amount to 12 issues or less.
Most comic fans want their creations brought back from the dead or cancellation as soon as they’re killed off. I’ve waited for years for my favorite to return. After reading this debut, I’m starting to think it would have been better if Mike Grell came back and finished the story of the original Travis Morgan with a blaze of glory and an eternal death for the character. At least it would have been quick. I’m going to give these guys some more time to impress me, but I doubt many other readers will.
To be honest, there’s so much more that I want to say about this comic, the creators, and most especially DC’s horrific publishing direction the past few years, but I’m not going to. I’ll save that venom for the future.
I’ll leave you with these rather childish parting words. Mike Grell’s version of the Warlord would kick the $&!% out of this new version. Nyah!
