Caliber: The First Canon of Justice by Radical Comics
Radical is a new company starting up this year and going for a very slick image, and I picked up Caliber yesterday on the advice of Mike, the owner of my local shop.
Promising. Very promising. The art is beautiful, and not just on the cover. The genre is western with strong mystical elements, and seems to be about the quest of a half-white shaman to get Caliburn a magic gun of destiny to King Arthur the Chosen One a prophesized Lawbringer. This issue covers his first attempt.
As indicated above, there are elements to the tale that are pretty common among mythic-type stories, but they are the sorts of elements that tend to catch my interest. What remains to be seen is whether or not they'll hold them.
The art is absolutely fantastic. Stunningly beautiful, very ornate, very complex. The only complaint is that sometimes it's so dark or so ornate that it's difficult to make out exactly what's going on (a flaw that's becoming more and more common in comic books). There are times when you just have to be happy with the general gist of things. A couple of samples of internal art (although, granted, these are clearer samples. Also, these do not appear one-right-after-another in the comic):
Hard to say much about the characters themselves. So far the only real stand-out is the shaman guy. You really don't have time to get to know most of them this issue, though, and the artwork, beautiful as it is, is not helpful in distinguishing characters.
32 pages, no ads, high quality paper, thick cover, beautiful art, promising story, and a cover price of $1.00. Even if this series doesn't pan out, for one dollar? I strongly recommend giving this issue a try. Personally, I'll be buying issue 2 a try, but for everyone else, there's no reason not to. Well, besides non-availability, that is.
Promising. Very promising. The art is beautiful, and not just on the cover. The genre is western with strong mystical elements, and seems to be about the quest of a half-white shaman to get Caliburn a magic gun of destiny to King Arthur the Chosen One a prophesized Lawbringer. This issue covers his first attempt.
As indicated above, there are elements to the tale that are pretty common among mythic-type stories, but they are the sorts of elements that tend to catch my interest. What remains to be seen is whether or not they'll hold them.
The art is absolutely fantastic. Stunningly beautiful, very ornate, very complex. The only complaint is that sometimes it's so dark or so ornate that it's difficult to make out exactly what's going on (a flaw that's becoming more and more common in comic books). There are times when you just have to be happy with the general gist of things. A couple of samples of internal art (although, granted, these are clearer samples. Also, these do not appear one-right-after-another in the comic):
Hard to say much about the characters themselves. So far the only real stand-out is the shaman guy. You really don't have time to get to know most of them this issue, though, and the artwork, beautiful as it is, is not helpful in distinguishing characters.
32 pages, no ads, high quality paper, thick cover, beautiful art, promising story, and a cover price of $1.00. Even if this series doesn't pan out, for one dollar? I strongly recommend giving this issue a try. Personally, I'll be buying issue 2 a try, but for everyone else, there's no reason not to. Well, besides non-availability, that is.