Image Comics and Spawn’s Universe #1 Spoilers and Review follows.
Hell Opens Up A New World Of Spawn(s)?!
The book has several more variant covers on top of the above.
Plus the main cover.
We open a creators credits page and the reveal of four stories for this issue.
We open with an old man named Cog and his cat at the waterfront attacked by ruffians, one of who Cog scarred earlier.
They kill Cog’s cat to…
…to capture some kind of serum they believe Cog has used to attain long life; Cog is now their captive too.
Elsewhere, through some crimefighting action pages…
…readers get to know Spawn’s raison d’etre though his internal monologue.
Spawn executes the gang members and tells their victim to flee; with readers get a look at the “confidential” papers she was carrying.
Elsewhere, in Spawn’s lair, his ally Mark and he discover Omega Spawn is still alive and that a trip to his island is needed.
Across the world, an angel recaps what is going on; some Spawn have fallen through some kind of stable rip in space-time and are in modern-day as Cog aka Cogliostro is captive.
Spawn and his ally Cy-Gor attack the forces on Omega Spawn’s island to…
…to be confronted by Disrupter (a name confirmed later in the issue, but it’s easier to recap this issue is if he has a name for you at this point); he is please Spawn seemingly disposed of Omega Spawn as now he can can claim the Hell’s Empty Throne.
Disruptor also touched and then turns Cy-Gor against Spawn!
A defeated Spawn is taken by Cy-Gor with Disruptor who meets up with Jericho; he was the “scarred” villain the book opened with.
After some explaining to the readers about how and why Disruptor and Jericho are in cahoots…
…Spawn is taken to be captive with Gunslinger Spawn (who came through that rip in space-time) and modern-day Cog.
It seems Disruptor doesn’t know which Spawn has whatever he is looking for so they’ll both live for now.
It also appears that there may be hope for fan-fave Cy-Gor who may, at some point maybe, fight off Disruptor’s control? If so, it would be painful physically and mentally.
The two Spawns kibitz…
…as Cig engineers his escape to complete his puzzle (whatever that is).
Looks like he needed a bullet from Gunslinger Spawn, but Cog is captured, willingly it would appear, and his kicked into large well / pit of some kind.
At the same time, the two Spawns tried to escape, but were jolted in response for several minutes, but they endeavour a further escape…
…that proves successful; Gunslinger Spawn relieving the guards of their modern day firearms.
At the bottom of the well / pit we see Cog’s completed, as the W5’s are answered, and…
…the Omega Spawn is reborn as a Plague Spawn also emerges; however, are they just power sources for Cog’s plan / puzzle?
Later, readers get to meet Crewman Thomas Miller whose family moments via Zoom, as he’s at sea, gets a few pages give readers a sense he may be a future Spawn host of some kind, but…
…he and the rest of the ship’s 200 strong crew all die…
…as unintended bystanders as someone named Sinn is also reborn! Is that the outcome of Cog’s plan? Is Sinn a reborn Cog with the powers of the Omega Spawn and the Plague Spawn?
We then get a Medieval Spawn back-up short story that…
…teases that perhaps he may exist in modern day too?!
Then a She-Spawn tale who…
…we know is around in modern-day.
Finally a tale about Gunslinger Spawn, who is around in modern day as know from the main story, is…
…is part of a back-up story firmly set in the past.
The book concludes with a message from the Toddfather as…
…the new King Spawn series is teased ahead of…
…a checklist of upcoming new series to adorn shelves alongside the core Spawn series.
Those series are King Spawn, Gunslinger Spawn and a team book of Spawns called The Scorched.
The Pulse:
I have not read the Spawn series regularly since its early 1990’s debut. I have visited the Spawn series over the years, as I have the Savage Dragon the only only other continuing series from one of the Image founders in the early 1990’s. Despite how established, interwoven and potentially complex the world of Spawn that has been created over the last 29 year is, I found the full issue rather accessible story-wise. I also found the characters compelling and the art teams quite solid. I am intrigued by the Spawn’s Universe being built here. 8 out of 10.
