Gunslinger Spawn #26 Review

 

Writer: Todd McFarlane

Artist & Inker: Dexter Soy

Colorist: Ivan Nunes

Letterer: Tom Orzechowski

Cover Artists: Ze Carlos; Gabriel Gomez

Publisher: Image

Price: 2.99

Release Date: November 22, 2023

 

Men came after Javier. He couldn’t kill them all. They tortured him and killed his sister. Why? Let’s leap into Gunslinger Spawn #26 and find out!

 

Story

Javier fashions his unique bullets, intent on killing his torturers and his sister's murderers. Like him, they now live among us. While Javier's thoughts return to the past, Taylor awakens in Waya’s home. He suffers as his body changes. Waya worries about them both. The 19^th Century Gunslinger and the gangly young man need each other.

 

In Gunslinger Spawn #26, Todd McFarlane salts Javier’s past with clues. As the men tortured him, they wanted to know his sister’s last words. They sought the source of his strength. We also learn the name of one assailant. Yet McFarlane leaves the reader demanding more. What did Javier do at his ranch that drew the men’s interest? And what about the uniforms they wore? Were the men sent on an official mission? Or were their uniforms merely disguises?

 

Art

Time and torture burnished Javier’s memories. He hung from a tree as knives pierced his flesh, arrows thudded into his chest, and bullets riddled his body. Left for dead in the grass, Javier lay staring at the sky. The burning sun echoed the fire blazing inside him. Ivan Nunes colors Javier's memories in yellow, orange, brown, and red. Dexter Soy's heavy inks threaten to leave us with silhouettes. Panels evoke sepia-toned photographs that last longer—and impart more warmth and color—than their Black and White cousins.

 

Dexter Soy focuses on foregrounds in Gunslinger Spawn #26. Detail and texture are everything to him. As Javier prepares for his next mission, Soy's panels seem photorealistic. Backgrounds blur away. Yet when Javier summons Dakota's gift, he roars away on a different type of steed. Backgrounds glow with blue, yellow, orange, and red. They swirl like colored liquids of different viscosities in a fish tank. The city rises behind him. The miles fall away. As Javier rides toward his revenge, his mask ripples like liquid metal and transforms his features.

 

Black uppercase words inhabit light yellow narrative boxes. As Todd McFarlane’s words guide us through Gunslinger Spawn #26, Tom Orzechowski outlines these boxes with gray. White dialogue balloons rarely intrude upon this grim tale, where turquoise sound effects match the wings of the insects that feast upon Javier's scarred and bleeding flesh. Dialogue balloons surprise on the final page with a color granted to another character in a recent issue. Does this signal that person’s return? Or something else?

 

Thanks to Image for providing a copy for review.

 

Final Thoughts

As Javier rides toward his next victim, remembering the blackest day of his life, Taylor suffers, and changes threaten both men in Gunslinger Spawn #26.

 

Rating 8.8/10

 

For another dazzling cover see my review at Comic Book Dispatch.

 

Lovecraft Unknown Kadath TP Review

 

Writer: Florentino Flórez

Artists: Guillermo Sanna & Jacques Salomon

Letterer: Saida Temofonte

Cover Artist: Gabriel Gomez

Publisher: Ablaze

Price: $19.99

Release Date: September 6, 2023

 

Roused from slumber, Randolph Carter spies gleaming towers rising above his native Boston. Yet each time the boy tries to enter this fabulous realm, he awakens in his bedroom. Is this incredible city a mirage or somewhere he can visit? Let's leap into the Lovecraft Unknown Kadath TP and find out!

 

Story

We next see Carter as a young man, fighting off the filthy Zoogs. When they realize he is the friend of Pickman and Kuranes, the creatures bring him to their council chamber. Carter wants to visit the land of Kadath. They tell him about a five-hundred-year-old priest who once scaled the mountains to see the gods dance. The Zoogs also warn him against searching for the city of his dreams: it's the gods’ home, not his.

 

Undeterred, Carter treks to Ulthar, where ancient Atal mentions a face carved into Mount Ngranek. If he finds a race of people with similar features, they’ll tell him how to reach Kadath. “Beware the black galleys,” Atal adds, drunk on moon-wine. On the priest's instructions, Carter travels to Dylath-Leen, where he drinks wine from a hollow ruby. He awakens aboard a black galley, where sailors eat food made from former slaves. 

 

 

 

So begins Ablaze’s Lovecraft Unknown Kadath TP, an eight-issue trade paperback adapted from H.P. Lovecraft's novella The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath. It follows Randolph Carter’s journey across the dreamscape of the late author’s mind. It’s a world filled with Night-Gaunts, Moon-Beasts, and kaiju-sized Sentinels. Carter's artist-friend Pickman is now a corpse-eating Ghoul, who urges Carter to not just travel through the dream but let it transform him. His friend Kuranes—a king who grew tired of his palaces and now lives in a house along the cliffs—pleads with Carter to remain with him. But then Kuranes becomes a queen and weeps when Carter leaves.

 

As Carter sails past moaning islands, braves narrow mountain trails, battles monstrous Gugs and Ghasts, and seeks a merchant who sells rare eggs, a black cat accompanies him. Yet the question remains: if he can enter the beautiful city, should he? Like many of us, Carter seeks perfection. Is he wrong to dream of Utopia? Or, as his friends Pickman and Kuranes suggest, should Carter seek perfection within?

 

 

 

Art

Guillermo Sanna & Jacques Salomon's art has a fluid, dreamlike quality in Lovecraft Unknown Kadath TP. Churning chaos takes on distinct and structured shapes. Taverns, temples, and towers evoke recognizable historic and fantasy landscapes. Some of the strange beings Carter meets resemble sea creatures. The Night-Gaunts evoke the flying bat-people who often took Human appearance in Marvel's 1970s Conan comics. Perspective shifts as readily as Kuranes changes sex, and page layouts also change. While unprepossessing, Sanna and Salomon prove that artists don’t need splash pages and double-page spreads to invoke awe.

 

Wait! Did I mention the whimsical Children's book-style interludes that conclude each chapter? Should I compare the first to Georges Méliès’ film A Trip To The Moon? (Or would that be a spoiler?)

 

Like their art, Sanna and Salomon’s coloring changes within panels to enhance Carter's nightmare journey. They load their palette with bright, contrasting colors in Lovecraft Unknown Kadath TP. Pink, purple, orange, and teal are their friends! Their limited color approach resembles markers wielded by experienced hands. While its sources aren't always apparent, light shines upon people and monsters in this dark Land Of Dreams.  

 

 

 

 

Black, uppercase words inhabit white dialogue balloons. When the artists' page compositions make reading order unclear, Saida Temofonte helps by changing balloon shapes and sizes. Aside from the chapter titles, Temofonte’s small lettering and print-handwriting font may stress tired, aging eyes. Thankfully, the font of Lovecraft’s novella, which Ablaze included with Florentino Flórez’s compelling adaptation, proves easier to read.

 

Final Thoughts

Ablaze’s Lovecraft Unknown Kadath TP invites similarities with the fantasy worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs and Robert E. Howard as it takes readers on a mesmerizing journey through the haunting landscape of the subconscious.

 

Rating 8.2/10

 

For the trade paperback cover art see my review at Comic Book Dispatch.

To preview interior art see the Previews World website.