Indie Comic Review: Aceblade #2

Previously…

Last month I reviewed Danny J. Quick and Christopher Hollers’ debut comic book Aceblade for their imprint 4th Wall Productions. The first issue was okay for their first excursion, so I decided to check out issue 2 and see if things were getting better and here’s what I’ve found.

Story

Our story begins where we left off, for real this time, our main character Terrell Durham aka Aceblade has just survived being riddled with automatic weapon fire and is laying in the bed of an acquaintance, who I’m assuming pulled him out of the ditch he was left to die in? She tells him she saw the owner of the club he fought at in the previous issue last night and Terrell decides to pay him a visit before he goes she gives him a hoodie and apparently some throwing knives to go visit Benjamin “Gutshot” O’sellis, the aforementioned club owner. What follows is an attack on Gutshots’ office by Terrell dressed in his Aceblade gear and a high-speed chase with the cops. While Aceblade is raising hell, Gutshot and his men are paying a visit to Terrell’s home where his pregnant wife Teresa and his dog Spike, who we didn’t learn about until just now, are waiting for him. Apparently, Gutshots’ men got there before Terrell did and planted a bomb. Which as you could’ve guessed destroys the home, killing his wife and dog in the process. Giving birth to Aceblade and his ride of vengeance.

Situation

The story continues the pace of issue one, which is fast, this starts off as a good thing and then slowly becomes a hindrance. The pacing of this issue is all over the place, a perfect example is when Aceblade breaks into Gutshot’s office and shakes down one of his employees what appears to be seconds after Gutshot, and company depart. Aceblade comes through the window roughs the guy up, then jumps out of the window, and somehow the cops are waiting outside for him. There is no way the cops could have been called by the man in Gutshot’s office and have arrived so quickly. Another thing is the mentality of the villains in the story, Gutshot a revered gangster and businessman, goes to Terrell’s house to retrieve money that the latter accepted through a fight. Gutshot encounter’s Terrell’s brother and the dog then leaves, but not before placing a bomb in their shed. If they’re looking for money, why would they blow up the house to find it? Why not just overpower the brother, kill the dog and take Terrell’s pregnant wife hostage until someone can locate the money for him? Also, if Terrell’s wife was so important to him, how come she wasn’t mentioned in issue 1?

Pictures

Vhon Remot reprises their role as an illustrator and does a passable job at bringing this book to life. The action scenes are still the best thing about this book, every strike, shot and slash is illustrated very well and the scene in which Aceblade leaps from the window in Gutshot’s office would make both Daredevil and Nightwing jealous. The coloring gives me an early 90’s vibe more “dark and muddy” versus “vibrant and alive”. This wouldn’t be a problem if the city they were in weren’t always so brilliantly lit by the sun or if we got more nighttime scenes.

Real

I really wanted to like this since I love vigilante and the obvious influence of Frank Miller’s Daredevil work is there, but this book seemed too rushed to actually execute what seemed to be a pretty good idea.

Purchase

As always if you enjoyed the review please take the time to support! You can purchase digitally here

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This review was written by Ra'Chaun Rogers on behalf of Concept Moon Studios. If you enjoy his comic reviews click here for more!

Indie Comic Review: Nia Griggs #0

Previously…

I have been making my rounds with the bevy of black superheroes comics from Spirits Destiny to Megawoman, so I’d be remiss if I didn’t share this little gem with the masses Nia Griggs and the Kemetic Sisterhood of Science. The tale of a woman granted extraordinary abilities in order to protect the world from rogue science, let’s begin, shall we?

Situation

Our story begins with a group of homegrown American terrorists robbing an ‘abandoned’ factory in Detriot, which is probably some sort of government research facility disguised as a factory. They attempt to come in under cover of nightfall only to be thwarted an army jeep flying through a brick wall courtesy of our title character. Flashback to one hour ago and our title character is arguing the musical styles of Esperanza Spaulding with her co-worker Greg. After she playfully threatens him with violence for disagreeing with her, go figure, she is reminded that she is entertaining several guests at her apartment and not at work. After a re-up of wine, Nia is summoned by her other boss, Oronike who informs her of the robbery promoting her to transform like Shazam into an amazonian powerhouse and leaps into action while confronting the terrorist she runs into their leader who has ingested whatever top-secret super-soldier serum the ‘factory’ working on. After a little villainous grandstanding the terrorist leader attempts to engage her, and keels over from a heart attack. Nia saves his life but not before hilariously knocking him out.

Story

Nia Girggs is a fun but short comic it feels a little rushed and frankly a bit unfinished. With that said the voice of the characters of Nia and Greg sound authentic, these are two people who are not only fans of music but have a critical ear for sound. I’ve always enjoyed journalist characters in comics would have liked to see more of Nia and Greg at work, being both music journalists and black, as we rarely if ever see characters like that in funny books. There are a few interesting mysteries in this book, such as where Nia’s powers came from, who Oronike is and most importantly of all who the Kemetic sisterhood of science is and how many members do they have.

Pictures

I really enjoyed the art fort this book, there is a Mike Mignola, which Bridgit Connell brings to the book. Nia looks stunning invoking shades of Wonder Woman and She-Hulk, she is imposing, to say the least. The monster that the terrorist morphs into is also expertly designed having the most Mignola-esque design in the book. Connell also does a great job of making sure that the black characters in the book have black features and aren’t just white people with a color swap. Lastly, I’d like to applaud her lettering especially when it came to the sound effects in the book, which pop off the page in a way similar to Frank Quietly’s.

Real

I enjoyed this book, but I felt it was too short and that a few more things could have been added to it just for the sake of the story. I look forward to more tales in the Nia Griggs universe.

Purchase

As always if you enjoyed the review please take the time to support! You can purchase digitally here

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This review was written by Ra'Chaun Rogers on behalf of Concept Moon Studios. If you enjoy his comic reviews click here for more!

Indie Comic Review: Moses #0

Previously…

It’s come to my attention that most of the comics I review receive pretty favorable scores and that’s mainly because I review comics that I think I’ll like. Most of the time these comics are in particular genre or written by an author I like so I’m usually enjoying the books, but today I’m stepping out of my comfort zone and decide to review Moses by Carlton and Darrick Hargro, a sci-fi mystery with some horror elements to it.

*Spoiler that ish*

Situation

Our story beings with a missing child and a hysterical family. Where the child went and who took him is a mystery, equally mysterious are the strangers who show up with promises to help the family retrieve their boy. Enter our heroin Moses, flanked by her cohorts Michael and Devon. Moses explains that the child was abducted by extra-terrestrials and have been doing so to people for decades at least. The reason for these abductions is never mentioned or implied but this is what has been going on, of course, the family doesn’t believe her until the abducted child returns beckoning his mother and younger brother to follow him into the light that has just brought him back. Moses and company begin to fire off rounds at the ship which fires back while trying to make their escape our heroine gets tired of running and uses her immense telekinetic powers to turn the gigantic alien space ship into a metal disk the size of a Frisby and that’s where it ends...for now.

Story

Unfortunately, I wasn’t a fan of this book. Don’t get me wrong, I like the setup fine, the theme of alien abduction has always been the most horrifying to me as far as the horror genre goes and the allusion to Moses being Harriet Tubman, freeing those held captive by the aliens isn’t lost on me either, however what took me out of the story was the pacing. The story felt rushed, Moses gives us an exposition dump about what happened to the boy, and conveniently after that, the aliens come back to take the rest of the family. The sense of urgency was also a miss for me since after a few laser blasts from the alien ship Moses just destroyed them effortlessly, I mean why were they even attempting to run from their attackers at all if she could just crush them like that? That last bit removed any tension that the comic held for me and left everything feeling a bit pointless overall.

Pictures

The art in this comic is ‘okay; at best Juan C. Baez and Manuel Avila do a serviceable job giving bringing the characters to life there’s just nothing spectacular about it. The characters don’t look particularly cool or special. I do appreciate however the designs of the alien ships and the panel layout which does a great job of setting the tone for the story in certain scenes. All in all, this wasn’t the worst artwork I’ve seen, but it didn’t blow me away either.

Real

I wanted to enjoy this book, I really did especially with the alien abduction angle but it felt too rushed to me and there wasn’t much established except that Moses is extremely powerful and shouldn’t be running away from giant alien spaceships.

Purchase

As always if you enjoyed the review please take the time to support! You can purchase digitally here

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This review was written by Ra'Chaun Rogers on behalf of Concept Moon Studios. If you enjoy his comic reviews click here for more!