The Seasons #2 Review

 

Writer: Rick Remender

Artist: Paul Azaceta

Colorist: Matheus Lopes

Letterer: Rus Wooton

Cover Artists: Paul Azaceta & Ramón K Pérez

Editor/Designer: Harper Jaten

Designer/Production: Erika Schnatz

Assistant Editor: Gabe Dinger

Publisher: Image Comics

Price: $3.99

Release Date: February 26, 2025

 

Autumn Seasons sent her sister a letter. But Spring lost it. When she found it again, the letter led Spring on a not-so-merry chase through the streets of New Gaulia. Autumn warned her youngest sister about a magical carnival. She urged Spring to flee New Gaulia. But by the time Spring opened the letter, the carnival had arrived. Is it too late for Spring and her family to escape the dangers that prompted Autumn’s letter? Let's leap onto our scooters, ride into The Seasons #2, and find out!

 

Story

Autumn Seasons may be a senior correspondent for The Global Gazette. But she's also an explorer. The mystery she most wishes to solve involves her parents. Autumn told Spring she found her parents in her letter. Yet when we glimpse Autumn in The Seasons #2, the explorer rides a motorcycle through a desolate land. Perhaps her statement in the letter was premature. As Autumn rides toward a temple on a hill guarded by a giant ape, she follows notes from her father’s journal.

 

Back home in New Gaulia, Spring races home to deliver Autumn’s warning to Winter. But her older sister hates distractions. Like Summer, who rarely contacts them, Winter spends her days absorbed in her work. With her parents missing, Autumn and Summer away, and Winter dissatisfied with her paintings, Spring relies on Gilbert to keep her sane. Perhaps her goldfish doesn’t speak psychically to her. Still, Spring needs someone to have intelligent discussions with. At least the humorous interplay staves off her loneliness.

 

Rick Remender sets his whimsical mystery in an alternative 1924. Spring resides in her parents' quiet and empty mansion in New Gaulia. In their absence, each daughter goes her separate way. Winter believes she is raising Spring. Yet the fourteen-year-old letter carrier spends her days working to put food on the table. Perhaps Spring will realize her dream of becoming a famous chef if she doesn’t fall prey to the malaise that struck the population of Neocairo. Like the sisters in The Seasons #2, even the strongest families can fracture when loved ones leave or die.

 

Art

Nothing symbolizes the seasons like foliage and flowers. Matheus Lopes lavishes a lively, limited palette on Paul Azaceta’s cheery, sad, picturesque, and eerie art. Blue flowers rise in a purple desert as Autumn rides toward a plateau beneath a yellow sky and an enormous moon. Red leaves adorn the pouch strapped to her belt as Autumn climbs the steps toward the ape sitting in the temple portico. Dried stems arise from a bottle in Winter's room, and snowflake ornaments hang from a pole. A lamp illuminates yellow and coral flowers in a vase. But the flowers in Winter’s painting are blue.

 

No flowers surround Summer as she lounges in a metal and canvas chair beneath a pink umbrella. But the purple sunglasses protecting her eyes from the tropical glare evoke a flower with closed petals. The opposite is true for Spring in The Seasons #2. A vase in the entry hall greets her when she returns home with Autumn's letter. The flowers burst forth in a crowded bouquet. Their bluish-purple petals spread wide to echo Spring's uniform.

 

Parchment scraps of italicized lowercase letters narrate an adventure that evokes early 20th-century occult authors like HP Lovecraft. People speak small, uppercase white letters that grow bold, shrink and swell, change colors, and deform balloons. Rus Wooton helps us hear grating in a crypt, Gilbert's bubble speech, Winter's anger, and the applause that greets Summer's announcement before a clown appears when you least expect it. Thanks to Image Comics and Giant Generator for providing a copy for review.

 

Final Thoughts

Autumn wanders a strange land. Winter struggles with her muse. Fame isolates Summer. Abandoned by her family and forced to grow up before her time, Spring must decide to leave one sister to find another or brave the dangers of the magical carnival alone in The Seasons #2.

 

Rating 9.4/10 

For another cover see my review at Comic Book Dispatch.