Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Red Lanterns v4: Death of the Red Lanterns TPB

You will never convince me that Peter Milligan doesn’t see this book as a sad joke. There are far, far too many instances of laughable dialogue in these pages. Let me give you some of the finer quotes.

“Gnnng… Gnnnn…”
“Gnngn! Kkilll…Yoouu…”
“Gannng…Gnnnn…Gnnnn”

I’m skipping over all the “Aarghs” and “Aagh’s”. But between them, they account for about 20% of the story. Plus, let’s be real, this is a story about a bunch of space monsters that are CONSTANTLY PUKING UP NAPALM BLOOD. And the lead? The closest thing we’ve got to a point of view character? His name is Rankorr! It’s not even spelled correctly!

There are a few moments when I almost made myself care, when the new 52/bad versions of good characters show up in the Stormwatch crossover. Seeing somewhat interesting characters fighting the Red Lanterns at least gives me someone to cheer for. Am I supposed to prefer Atrocitus over Abysmus? I can’t even read their names without giggling. Don’t worry, their angst-ridden dialogue is full of purple prose, exposition, and lots of vomit. I mean that literally, as a Red Lantern, about 50% of Atrocitus’ dialogue is positioned over a spume of red puke. 

The art is acceptable, but is lacking backgrounds in almost every scene. Every character is disgusting, with bones and spikes poking out of flesh. Some of the panels look a bit… computery? Miguel Sepulveda's style is way too "house New 52" for me. 


I suppose, in the end, there was sort of a point to the story in this collection. But man, it sure takes a long time to get there. The pacing had driven out the last of my limited interest about halfway through this EVIL comic. 

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