The Second Life of Doctor Mirage #8 (Classic Valiant)

Ever since his deadly encounter with evil necromancer Master Darque, paranormal investigator Hwen Mirage has been a phantom. While he now has extraordinary powers to manipulate energy, he can't touch anything, including his wife Carmen. One day, Hwen is feeling frustrated over never being able to eat, which seems like an innocuous enough problem at first, but soon he starts feeling hunger pains, and his powers start to fade. Realizing that he needs to absorb necromantic energy to survive, Hwen sets out on finding a solution to his dilemma, even if it means confronting the very necromancer who originally took his life...

Issue #8 of The Second Life of Doctor Mirage is, as usual, a highly enjoyable read! It's a self-contained story, easily accommodating to new readers, and gets across good characterization. This issue mostly keeps its attention on the title character, Hwen Mirage, as he experiences new difficulties with his unique condition. While Hwen is the main focus, we do still get to know what Carmen is like (mainly that she's not just a pretty face, but is an extremely intelligent scientist too).

As well as having a well-written plot, which brings up some uncomfortable truths about how Hwen may have to sustain his necromantic existence, Issue #8 of Doctor Mirage is also quite funny. The humour never feels forced, and while it's not hilarious, the general good nature of this series is more than enough to bring a broad grin to my face!

This issue has some build-up for things to come in the series in the form of character Sandria Darque making cryptic statements about Hwen being 'The One', and I was actually surprised to know that this leads somewhere, because every prior comic in the Valiant shared universe with Sandria Darque that I've read has her character being mysterious for mystery's sake, like an episode of Lost rather than an actual character with definable goals.

The artwork this issue is very good! Faces in a few panels look a bit angular, but not poorly drawn. Overall, this is very pleasing to the eye!

This is an immensely satisfying issue of The Second Life of Doctor Mirage, and I highly recommend it!

Q2: The Return of Quantum and Woody #1 (New Valiant)

Finally, my most anticipated comic series of the year is out-Q2: The Return of Quantum and Woody!

Quantum and Woody was an extremely popular comedy superhero series from Acclaim Comics back in the '90's, and it's gotten more fans with age. It's so good that as of this date, it's the only original comic from Acclaim's Valiant lineup that New Valiant has remade! And naturally, the current version is a joy to read too! The reason behind this new miniseries existing is that the original Q&W series was cancelled in 2000, and its story was never finished. Now, Valiant has awesomely let original series creators Christopher Priest and MD Bright to make a sequel miniseries! That is so cool of them to allow that!

It's been twenty years since the superhero duo Quantum and Woody were at large, and they seem to have since retired. One night, however, Woody van Chelton finds out that Quantum is back in the game, fighting a powerful superhuman soldier at a museum. Quantum loses the fight, and Woody helps him out, soon realizing that this isn't Eric Henderson, but a new hero taking up the mantle...

This issue is really just an introduction to this miniseries. We don't get a huge insight into the personalities of the title characters, nor do we know who the two new ones are, or who apparent villain Koro is. We don't even know what the story is yet.

With all these problems into account, if this was the first issue in a regular series, its structure's execution would be terrible, but as Q2 is a miniseries, I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt, as this is just the first section of a bigger story, rather than a regular first issue (not that such a thing exists in today's comic industry though).

As this issue is mostly an introduction, there's not a whole lot of humour on display. Hopefully there's more as the series continues.

One thing I can judge about Q2's writing at this stage is that it's good. It's too soon to tell if the non-linear structure will complement the rest of the story at this stage, but it seems interesting so far. This issue is mildly accommodating to readers who are new to all things Quantum and Woody, but only come the end. If you don't know what this franchise is about, you'll be pretty lost until Woody starts explaining the duo's origin to the other 'Woody'.

The art here is very good, although Woody's face does look a bit odd in a couple of places. As for the cover, it looks neat and stylish, though Woody's face is blocky and weird, especially thanks to the shadows covering him.

On its own, I'm not sure what to think of this. As this is Quantum and Woody, I can't not recommend Q2's first issue, but I suggest getting it when the whole series is out, so you can read the whole story at once, and get the proper effect. If you've already read it and have immediately lost optimism, finding it a confusing mess and hoping for the return of the current Quantum and Woody series ASAP, well you don't need to worry, as it's just on hiatus because of the duo co-starring in Valiant crossover The Delinquents, and following that, it'll be coming out concurrently with Q2, so you won't be missing out on the iteration you prefer...

Doctor Spektor, Master of the Occult #3 (Dynamite Comics)

It's been about six months since four-issue miniseries Doctor Spektor, Master of the Occult started, and it's still only three-quarters out! That's the Dynamite Gold Key schedule screwups in a nutshell. Fucking punks, making the same damn mistake that Dark Horse made in 2010 when they remade these exact same properties! I wish you could punch synchronicity in the face!

Reality TV paranormal investigator Dr. Adam Spektor is caught up in some interdimensional stuff, while his dedicated assistant Abby may or may not be in an alternate universe that is not actually alternate, and doesn't really exist, except that it does. Stuff happens with her too.

...That really is the best I can do for you. There's no other way to summarize the plot to this mess of a series!

As I said in my review for the last two issues of Doctor Spektor, the first was an interesting opener to a series on the paranormal and the ooky, with an interesting framing for events, while the dreadful second issue completely threw everything-the series' own conceit included-out the window in favour of inter-dimensional hijinks! The original Gold Key Occult Files of Doctor Spektor was a simple series about a paranormal investigator. It had a couple of crossovers with other Gold Key characters here and there, and that was it, yet the Dynakey 'remake' is using that as an excuse to turn this damn thing into Crisis of Infinite Spektors!

The story, or lack thereof, here is pathetic! Three issues in, and we still have no idea what this plot is! Oh there's an explanation alright, but it doesn't mean things are actually happening. And the exposition dumps we get masquerading as plot are clunky, boring, and incredibly confusing! Since there's only one issue left to this rotten mess, it seems like there'll be the bare minimum of room left to explain everything, resolve everything, have character moments, and end this miniseries.

But then again, the characters of this miniseries have been lacking from the get-go! Abby's sole defining trait is that she's Doctor Spektor's assistant, and she has to help him because her boss really, really wants her to. Spektor has no character to him, besides wanting to bang a dream woman for no reason, and the same goes for everyone else in this mess! Gail is a person who talks, while the Gold Key characters are even less!

While this miniseries purports to be a crossover with the other Dynakey characters (Solar, Man of the Atom, Magnus, Robot Fighter, and Turok, Dinosaur Hunter), it isn't really. Those characters appear, but it's entirely superficial. Turok has literally no dialogue save for 'Haha!', and Magnus, who gets the most dialogue, is completely different to how he is in his own series. The Gold Key characters amount to nothing here, as they have literally zero character or personality to them (and are a doubly pointless addition to those reading this series who don't know about the other Dynakey series'), and all they do is kill jail guards who don't exist but not really, because because.

The rest of the writing has characters saying really stupid things (such as Magnus being angry that Spektor is being uncooperative and unbelieving of his story, despite the fact that Magnus is the one who just attacked him, unprovoked, without saying a word), or being just plain contradictory (like Gail's actions and dialogue althroughout this issue, as she assures Abby that the world she is currently in is one of 'Nothing' by showing her the absurd things present, such as ancient Native American Indian warriors and costumed superheroes, then is suddenly working with them, as if they're real, because apparently they are. Although they're probably not. But are. This series is a confusing mess!).

The artwork is very mixed! Sometimes it's good, but a lot of the time, it's amateurish. Skin tones change constantly, and the angles are sometimes =. Worst is the clashing art-Some parts are harshly inked, whereas other moments are clear and polished. The cover is bland as hell. It shows almost nothing, and it a complete non-sequitur.

Issue #3 of Doctor Spektor, Master of the Occult is dreadful! It's at least more of a Point A to Point B story than the insanely structured previous issue, but it's still a confusing load of garbage that accomplishes nothing!

In about a fortnight, the concluding issue to Doctor Spektor, Master of the Occult may come out, but it'll probably fail to again, even though it should have come out two frakking months ago! If you like this series, I apologize for your bad luck. If you've never read this series, I suggest you keep things that way. To me, this series is nothing but a cheap version of notorious Valiant-Image crossover Deathmate...

Dream Date With A Villain Vol. 1 (Heretical Sexts)

My Dream Date with a Villain is a new magazine/comic that comes from awesome blogger Tenebrous Kate, a huge fan of 'questionable' genre films, and the kind of person who'd watch SS Extermination Love Camp for a fun afternoon (and quite frankly, so am I). Her new publishing imprint Heretical Sexts has just been launched, and Dream Date, its first product to be released, focuses on an extremely nifty topic-How do villains date?

Dream Date is a collection of fifteen short stories (penned by various authors), some text, some in comic form, and one in a photographic format. Despite the rapid shifts in both art styles, format, and plots, the stories (all ranging from one to three pages) all flow very nicely.

I found all of the stories in this collection highly amusing, and even ones that didn't make me laugh much were still entertaining reads. One that might be divisive is the Chillin' With Lo Pan story. I dug its brief absurdity, but some might dislike it for those same reasons, and I can understand why.

The concept behind this zine is definitely a highly interesting one (to me, at least), and it pulls it off great! Seeing Dr. Doom's violent reactions to 'troubles' in the bedroom is just as amusing as would expect, as is Ilsa, Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks (also She Wolf of the SS, Tigress of Siberia, and Wicked Warden, respectively) finding romance via a dating profile, and the Dream Dates Gone Wrong segment, wherein we learn that M.O.D.O.K. is a lush, and that the Hamburgler is a smug 9/11 conspiracy theorist!

My Dream Date with a Villain's main target audience is definitely a very niche one, but that thankfully doesn't make it inaccessible to people unfamiliar with the material the stories draw from (although the Gaston story won't be as amusing to those who aren't familiar with the Disney Beauty and the Beast movie). This is also a very macabre collection (in a good way, of course!), so it's definitely not for everybody.

As I said above, the artwork is very good here, with many nifty varying styles, some simpler than others. I especially dig the cover, which is a treat for the eyes!

To finish, My Dream Date with a Villain is extremely entertaining, and well worth a read! Tenebrous Kate does not disappoint, nor do any of her many collaborators! Heretical Sexts is a classy kinda macabre!...


*For those interested, My Dream Date with a Villain is available for purchase at http://www.hereticalsexts.com/*

Shadowman: Overall (New Valiant)

I originally wasn't going to say anything more about New Valiant's awful horror-superhero series Shadowman, but I've decided to so I can address all the series' problems at once. Normally, the plan is to do 'Overall' reviews for series' that have run their course and ended, whereas Shadowman is merely on a hiatus...maybe. Either way, it's gonna take at least six months before the series comes back, if it comes back,so I'll talk about all of this now.

Shadowman is about Jack Boniface, the latest in the line of a family lineage of Voodoo warriors. Jack has only recently moved to New Orleans, years after his mother hastily moved away when she was pregnant with him. Due to her efforts, Jack knows nothing about Voodoo, magic, or the Shadowmen, and is abruptly thrust into the dark world when the demonic servants of an evil necromancer named Nicodemo Darque attack him. Jack unwillingly transforms into Shadowman and fights back the demons, with the help of the Abettors, who are a group of people sworn to help the Shadowmen. Jack soon realizes that Darque is trying to break through from a ravaged dimension known as Lyceum to Earth, and will bring about the apocalypse if he succeeds...

Shadowman has a great storytelling engine-A magical superhero fighting supernatural monsters and villains. Unfortunately, due to the comic industry's exceedingly nasty habit of only telling four-issue long stories, Shadowman has only had five storylines over 20 issues! This would be bad enough, but said storylines get across extremely little character, or plot, and they establish very little about the setting, and Voodoo. Over these first thirteen issues, the series wasn't very good, and needed a lot of fixing, but unfortunately, that wasn't what it got.

The original writers left the series after Issue #12, and British comic writer Peter Milligan was brought onto Shadowman starting with Issue #13, and he really didn't get it! The guy seems to have had a good track record, but here, he either didn't read the previous thirteen issues of Shadowman, or he detested them and wanted to retcon everything! There are so many continuity errors between Milligan's issues and the rest of the series, and he's also made radical and unwelcome changes that drastically shortened the series' shelf life, The only thing that can save Shadowman now is a hard reset, whether it be by retcons to alter what Milligan has wrought, or by new writers simply washing their hands of everything that came before and starting fresh with a new main character.

The characters in this series are dull, and have very little to them. We know very little about the series' lead, Jack Boniface, and we never get any insight into his character, such as how he feels about becoming a magical warrior against his will. There's also a really forced romance between Jack and Abettor friend Alyssa. It comes out of nowhere, is set up too quickly, and ditched just as fast. As for Alyssa's character, she's likeable, but nothing special.

Series villain Darque is pretty dull. There's not much too him at all either-He's just an evil guy who's evil because he's evil. There was a #0 issue that tried to give him some character by showing his origin, but this story only shows Darque as a little kid, all the way back in 1812, and therefore creates a huge disconnect between his character there and in the present day. Issue #10 is a sequel to #0, but it skips forward about sixty years, and any character growth for Darque from his time as a kid to present is only presented very briefly in a narrated one-page montage.

Likeably snide British Voodoo priestess Punk Mambo is a very amusing character, but unfortunately her character is stuck in a poorly written series. And then there's Jaunty! He's a character originally from the Acclaim Comics Shadowman series/game, and it's because I know that that I have at least some background on who he is. The Jaunty here comes out of nowhere, and we never have any idea who he is, or why he is what he is (a seemingly living being in Deadside, and a monkey in a top hat).

Finally, the writing. While the stories over the first thirteen issues isn't very good, the dialogue is at least decent, but when Peter Milligan took over, it took a severe downturn! Some of the post Issue #12 dialogue is absolutely terrible! And there are also a few nagging plot holes in the series post #12 too.

Shadowman stopped at Issue #16, and continued with a miniseries called End Times. This was a mistake in my opinion, as End times not only has zero reason to be a miniseries rather than just being Issues #17 to #19, but it's also not accommodating in the slightest. The miniseries is purportedly a jumping-on point, but any readers who'd start Shadowman by picking up End Times #1 will just be confused as hell! And nothing bad that happens to any of the characters and their relationships will have any impact on new readers, as they won't have read the preceding issues where such things were established!

End Times is widely hated among Valiant fans, as it completely destroys the series. Peter Milligan's innumerable extreme retcons, plot holes, and continuity errors are bad enough, but apparently not content with ruining the series via those avenues, Milligan has completely and irrevocably screwed over Jack Boniface's character by abruptly turning him into a whining, stupid, and petulant villain!

Shadowman has been on hiatus ever since End Times finished, and I have no idea what the future holds for it, if anything. It might come back, but in what form is anyone's guess! Either way, if Shadowman doesn't come back, it won't be a big loss. At its best, this iteration of the series was extremely mediocre and wasteful, and at its worst, insultingly bad. New Valiant has much better series going on, so if you're interested in its lineup, feel free to peruse them and skip this...

Shadowman: End Times #1, #2, #3 (New Valiant)

Remember that in my last review of Valiant superhero series Shadowman, I said that for all that storyline's crippling faults, it actually had a happy ending? Yeah, prepare to have that utterly destroyed, and replaced with depression!

Jack Boniface is the latest in the family lineage of Shadowmen, Voodoo warriors devoted to fighting the evil necromancer Master Darque. Jack has successfully slain Darque, but is now facing problems when the malevolent Shadow Loa, the source of his powers, tries to take control. Jack is able to beat back control over his body and mind with the help of his love for girlfriend and magical comrade Alyssa, but the Loa has one last trick up its sleeve. It tells Jack the truth about his father, Josiah Boniface, who didn't die as previously thought, but instead faked his death and secretly fled from the realm of the living. Furious that Josiah abandoned his family, Jack's mind is warped by the Loa as he hunts his father down for bloody revenge...

Last time I talked about Shadowman, I talked about the new creative team that took over the series from Issue #13, and how new head writer Peter Milligan clearly didn't read the preceding thirteen issues of the series, as his starting arc is positively bloated with massive continuity errors and radical changes that make no sense, such as suddenly making the untethered spirit that gives Jack Boniface his Shadow powers an evil Loa (sort-of Voodoo god)! As if that wasn't bad enough, the changes that Milligan made to the Shadowman concept completely ruins the series. This is meant to be a superhero series, but if the spirit giving the hero his powers is evil, what then? Do we see this depressing struggle overtake the series and dominate it for the rest of the comic's run, or would Jack eventually get rid of the spirit? The latter option would end the series, so Shadowman is stuck with the former option, and in doing so has doomed itself! Its shelf life is now minimal at best!

The crux of this miniseries' plot is that Jack Boniface's father Josiah, who died during a final battle with Darque, really faked his death and escaped to a near-inaccessible magical location known as the Voodoo Lands. Cracks start to show in this storyline right away when you start thinking about the plot for even a minute. It makes no sense! Why did Josiah fake his death? He's not a bad guy, and he genuinely didn't want to abandon his family, and doing so was such a great sacrifice that it allowed him access to the Voodoo Lands. It doesn't make sense for him to have faked his death to escape the Shadow Loa, because he has either two choices-One, die in battle, or Two, Reluctantly abandon his family, living the rest of his life in an empty, dead world, alone, doing nothing, with absolutely nothing to do but wear a cloak. What's the point of escaping his death, then, if that's all he has to look forward to?

On top of all of that, there's one final problem regarding this plot point-Josiah Boniface is DEAD! We saw him in Deadside in Issue #3! There was no faking that! We saw his actual, legitimate, unfakeable deceased spirit, and he communicated with Jack, giving him advice and power, and offering to rid him of the Shadow Loa. He could have done it too, if not for Jack needing it to save Alyssa! And this miniseries is treating him as a craven coward for abandoning his family to deal with the evil Loa on their own? No, he didn't! Even if he was alive in that scene, it doesn't change the fact that he has helped Jack greatly.

The Abettors continue to make no sense. They're meant to be good guys, and the protectors to the Shadowmen, but at the first sign of trouble, they instantly have the Shadowmen killed! Not only does this not sync up with previous continuity, as I mentioned in my last review, but it paints the Abettors as a bunch of idiots! They're meant to help the Shadowmen, yet they always, always end up killing them, or the Shadowmen go nuts and kill themselves, or they die in battle before they can be driven crazy! Give up, you Abettor jerks! This arc explicitly says that every single Shadowman went crazy! Every. Single. One! Shelf life, Milligan!

The writing for this miniseries is poor. Jack's inner monologue is constant, the characters are bland and/or annoying, and there's some really stupid dialogue! On that last note, there's even a moment here where, just like in the last arc, Peter Milligan's characters again show that they has no idea that love still exists! That's an oddly specific recurring trend here! He must really want his characters to be deluded idiots! And this guy worked on Grant Morrison's Animal Man series?!

Another continuity error made with Shadowman continuity is in regards to the afterlife of Deadside. In Issue #2, Jack goes into Deadside, and says "Every minute I stay here costs me. Hours, days, even weeks are shaved off my mortal coil." WRONG! Jesus, is Peter Milligan actively trying to retcon ever single aspect of this series?! He must hate Issues #0 to #12 of Shadowman!

Onto the characters. Now that one of the new creative team's many, many retcons is set in, the previously silent and non-sentient Shadow Loa does not shut up!

In the past, Jack Boniface has always been a dull character, but here, he's more than a dullard-He's a whiner! He whines, and whines, and whines, and whines, and doesn't shut the fuck up! He's an annoying crybaby who needs to grow a pair! That's bad enough, but things actually get worse! End Times represents the complete ruination of his character, as it starts off with him as a petulant whinging crybaby dickhead, then turns him into a villain, out of nowhere! I said above that having the Shadow Loa be evil has crippled the series' shelf life, but this has done so even worse!

Not only does Jack have an out-of-character obsession, which as I said above, doesn't even make sense, given his previous interaction with Josiah in Deadside, but to gain access to the Voodoo Lands, where Josiah lives, Jack has to make a great sacrifice, and he does so by cruelly breaking Alyssa's heart. Then, when he's in the Voodoo Lands, Jack decides to ask for help from someone who was present when his father died-Darque! That's right, the so-called most evil sorcerer to have ever lived. The man who tried to bring about the apocalypse! The man the Shadowmen literally exist to stop, and Jack brings him back to life! AND THEN HE MAKES A BLOOD PACT WITH HIM! Ignoring that idiocy for a second, it doesn't even make sense for Jack to consider Darque's help, because One, Why would Darque help him? He's evil, and his mortal enemy! Two, Jack impaled and killed him, so I really doubt he'd want to help. And Three, Why would Darque know what happened to Josiah just because he was the last person to see him before his 'death'? If he had, he probably would've done something about it, or perhaps mentioned it! And of course, to make all of this even dumber, Darque doesn't know a thing, so Jack brought back pure evil into the world for no reason...And is now tied into a blood pact with him. *clap clap clap*.

Unfortunately, we're still not done yet! Jack finds Josiah, then after whining petulantly, he snaps his father's neck! And that causes the horrible death of his mother's spirit. And then Jack decides to team up with Darque as his servant! I was on the official Valiant forums when End Times ended, and most people hated this miniseries with a passion, for its flagrant continuity errors, and for what it does to Jack Boniface. Now, I'm a Michael Leroi fan (the Shadowman of Acclaim Comics, and more importantly, the video game), so while I don't give a shit about dull Jack Boniface, I do care when a series completely screws over its protagonist!

Seeing as Jack Boniface is now beyond the 'moral event horizon', I guess he's a permanent villain now, or at least won't return to being the hero. Or maybe he'll suddenly get the power to kill Darque again immediately, then go home to Alyssa with the most screwed up 'The funniest thing happened to me on my way to the Voodoo Lands' story ever!

Maybe the series will get itself a new Shadowman, and if so, I hope its Michael LeRoi. I've never been endeared to any version of Jack Boniface, as they're all dull, and useless Shadowmen! The Shadow powers the Jack of the original series possessed only extended to being able to hit people slightly harder than a regular human. Michael Leroi, on the other hand, not only had numerous Voodoo abilities and weapons, but he was immortal! Despite an extremely harsh background, he never whined, and was instead a powerful voodoo lord. He was in control, and he was the Shadow Man! There was no split-personality driving him to be the heir to the mantle, but he instead did it because he was the one who had to.

Alyssa does practically nothing this arc but be put down by Jack. Also, it doesn't make sense for her to believe Jack's cruel words to her at the end of Issue #2. The first issue of Shadowman implied that she's either a psychic, or at the least, a sensitive, so either way, she'd know that Jack was lying*. but to be fair, the entire series since Issue #2 forgot that, so that's not only just the fault of the new creative team.

*Though of course, she'd already know he's lying, because she's not stupid.

As with the last Shadowman storyline, British punk Voodoo priestess Punk Mambo is still the only good thing here. She's likeable and amusing...But unfortunately, she's still in a poorly written series, so there's no shortage of dumb moments with her, such as when Alyssa talks to her, saying that Jack is obsessed with Punk Mambo, and vice versa, which is bull! Yeah, the two have interacted a bit, but neither are obsessed with the other! Alyssa also says that Jack made a connection with Mambo, and "I know that somewhere in that warped brain of yours, you care for him". Wrong! Jack didn't make a connection with her at all, neither does it make sense for Mambo to care about him! He's just some guy who came to her for help with an exorcism. Also, when they first met, one of the few times they've even interacted, Mambo set him on fire as she forced him out of her home! That doesn't sound like the act of someone caring for another to me!

Deadside dude Jaunty returns in this arc, completely out of nowhere, and as if the artwork for him wasn't bad enough, his character has now been altered to that of a servant and suck-up. His character here doesn't mesh with previous appearances at all, and one really annoying problem, with the entirety of Shadowman, is that everyone calls Jaunty 'Trickster', even though he's never displayed any such personality!

Another returning character from a previous storyline is Baron Samedi, and his only scene leads to some really idiotic dialogue from Jack. He goes to visit Samedi, and rudely asks if his father is alive or not, and Samedi kicks him out of his domain, telling him to learn some manners. Cut to a few scenes later, Jack is saying to Alyssa that the Baron told him Josiah is alive. NO, HE DIDN'T!

The artwork for this miniseries isn't very good. It's not terrible, but the at style is poor, blocky, and far too simple in places. The covers are crummy. Not only do all three have a radically different art style, not only are they dull non-sequiturs, but the action on Issue #2 and #3's covers obscure the damn title!

My final problem with Shadowman: End Times is that it has literally no reason to be a miniseries! It's just the next storyline, nothing more. Also, this is not accommodating to any newcomers, who will likely be confused as hell, despite picking up an Issue #1.

I've ranted long and hard about this, and I'm relieved to finally have nothing left to say about this putrid mess of a series! Don't get it! Never get it! It's just a waste of money! This series never stays consistent, never establishes anything well enough, whether it be characters, or the setting, and the continuity errors and retcons are so numerous and dreadful that there is no saving this series. It's dead in the water, and has been ever since this miniseries. What does the future hold for it? Well it might come back, once sort-of spinoff The Death Defying Doctor Mirage, and the spin-off Punk Mambo one-shot are out, and I admit, I am curious to see where Shadowman will go next. Will the ruination run deeper, if such a thing is even possible at this point, or will a new new creative team be in charge, and will they retcon everything Peter Milligan has wrought as merely being a fever dream? I bloody hope so!...

Shadowman #13X, #13, #14, #15, #16 (New Valiant)

I've already made no secret of my distaste for Valiant's current Shadowman series, but here is where we really reach my boiling point! The series was bad up until now, but at least it was consistent! And it wasn't that horribly bad!...

Jack Boniface is losing control. He's been the Shadowman (a Voodoo concept that the series has still hardly bothered to explain) for months now, and things have been as fine as they can when you're forcibly entrusted with supernatural powers to aid you in fighting an evil necromancer named Darque. However, Jack's started having blackouts, and when he wakes up, he's covered in blood, and can't remember what he's done. The Shadowman protectors, the Abettors, realize Jack is struggling, hence they want to kill him, and implant the sacred power to someone they deem to be more stable. In an effort to evade their attempts on his life, Jack goes into a desolate Louisiana swamp, where the mysterious Punk Mambo is reputed to live. She tries to help him, but Jack realizes that the Loa (sort-of Voodoo god) inside him is a malevolent, nasty being, intent on violently slaughtering other criminal Loas for its own purposes. Meanwhile, an evil fear Loa named Tremble is taking advantage of the Shadowman's weakening position, and starts spreading chaos over the city of New Orleans...

Beginning with Issue #13, a new creative team took over Shadowman, and they screwed things up really badly! I am not kidding when I say these new writers did not read the previous fourteen issues! Either that, or they detested them, which begs the question why are they working on the series to begin with! The continuity errors are many and vast! Let's dig into this before anything else.

First of all, it retcons Jack's backstory. He's always been a nice, well-adjusted guy, but this new storyline suddenly shoehorns in a past of constant violent outbursts, and a severe anger problem. Now you could theoretically have a past like this for the character, but springing something this major about his backstory on your readers after fourteen issues isn't very good writing, in my opinion. Also, At the start of Issue #1, Jack was furious to find out that, according to police files, his parents were violent criminals. If he himself was had violent tendencies, he wouldn't have felt as betrayed as he did there. And no, he wasn't angry because he 'realized that he was violent because of genetics'. The reason for his anger at that revelation is explicitly explained.

The Shadowman power isn't really a sentient being, but is rather an untethered, unborn spirit-That's it. Yet this storyline is now treating the 'Loa' inside Jack as a conscious being, which is wrong! It was only ever a mindless spirit that empowers the Boniface's, not a malevolent spirit that slowly destroys its hosts! This power was created by Sandria Darque from the soul of her dead newborn baby to empower Marius Boniface and defeat her evil necromancer brother Darque, yet this storyline says she used a Loa. It also calls her 'a young woman well-versed in the art'-She was about seventy years old! And 'well-versed' is the friggin' understatement of the year! She's the sister to the most powerful necromancer in Voodoo history!

I already mentioned how much the origin for the Shadowman lineage in Issue #10 irks me in a previous review. This storyline makes things worse. Now that the Shadowman 'Loa' is an evil spirit, every single Shadowman was corrupted or destroyed by it, save for Marius, as it slowly drives them insane, bringing up all the darkness in them and warping their minds, driving some to madness, and others to alcoholism and suicide. One, WRONG! Two, the Shadowman legacy is a pretty shitty one if literally every single Shadowman went insane and offed themselves only a few years into the job! What must the Abettors think when the spiritual warriors they're supposed to protect invariably go crazy and/or suicidal?! I'd give up after the third one jumped off a tall building, and just go after Darque with a high-powered rifle from a faraway hill!

Speaking of the Abettors, they're now a huge 'network'! In the last several issues, the only ones we've ever seen are Dox and Alyssa. Now those issues don't say that they're the only remaining Abettors left, but it's implied, given that they are literally the only people helping Jack out. There are no other Abettors around when Jack first became the Shadowman, or when the Brethren tried to bring Darque into Liveside by way of a horrific gestalt demon, or when Darque started his plans for the apocalypse!

These  Abettors' motivations are iffy due to poor writing and poor continuity. They view the Shadowmen as their their messiah, which is wrong! It's just a Voodoo lineage created to stop Darque, and the Abettors are meant to help! Also, Darque is dead! There's no more need for a Shadowman! But what about his cult, The Brethren, you ask? Well for one, it never seemed all that big to begin with, and two, their messiah is now dead, and one of their biggest players is out of the game, so they can hardly do much of anything, and three, they never appear again after Darque's death, nor are they ever mentioned, so the implication is that they were indeed destroyed thanks to Darque's demise.

As the power inside Jack is now being written as an evil spirit, he's now desperate to be rid of it, but no-one he approaches can exorcise the 'Loa'. Hmmm, Jack, maybe you should, I dunno, go find Sandria-The one who gave your family the power to begin with! She is immortal, so you have no excuse not to look for her! The series never bothers to explain Sandria's whereabouts, so if she's dead, we wouldn't know.

Ok, all of that aside, how does this storyline stack up?...It sucks! It's poorly written, for a start! The biggest problem is that multiple plot points are extremely rushed. The Abettors want Jack's head on a pike, but suddenly switch to helping him, the blooming romance between Jack and Alyssa is really abrupt, and the way the Tremble fear Loa is dispatched makes little sense, and only takes a scant couple of pages. As for the dialogue, it's terrible in places!

Examples include when the Abettors are discussing Jack's stability as Sadowman. They say that Marius Boniface, the first Shadowman, was able to tame the 'Loa' due to his love for Sandria Darque, and they maybe they could find someone for Jack...but then one of them says that this would be a futile plan, as "that kind of love probably doesn't exist anymore". What?! Wow, way to be dumb, and insulting, writers!

Then there's Alyssa offering to help Jack's stability by asking him if he'd be able to fall in love with her. Because that's how love blossoms, right? No, it isn't? Of course! Also, Jack and Alyssa have neither shared any chemistry, or romantic/character building moments together in this entire series, so this seems really out of character on her part! Her badly written blase response to his surprise at her question is "Come on, don't tell me you haven't even thought about it a little. I'm not totally repulsive, am I?". People don't talk this way about love! What's worse is Alyssa's supposed attitude to Jack's response. After she says that "Maybe I could be your Sandria", Jack says "I...I don't know. I c-can't think about anything like that. Not now. Not until I get my head straight. You understand right?". Because he said that, Jack then thinks that he hurt Alyssa's feelings, and she'll hate his guts for how he 'rejected' her. But he didn't reject her! His response wasn't a rejection in the slightest!

More terrible dialogue is pictured below...

Along with Issues #13 to #16, this arc also has a bafflingly named #13X, which is an eight page short story. It's a prequel to this storyline, but covers nothing that isn't said in the story itself multiple times, so it's basically a $2 dollar waste in every way possible.

There are quite a few stupid plot points. I'll focus on just the one here, because I want to end this monster of a post soon! Since they're planning on killing Jack, the Abettors have a fallback host for the Shadowman 'Loa'...who's a priest! This fallback host must have only known about Voodoo for a few days at most, because the Abettors say they only sought her out when they uncovered Jack's chequered past. I can buy that they were able to convince this that magic actually exists in only a few days, but convincing her to abet in a friggin' murder?! She's a priest!

The artwork in this storyline has changed just as radically as the writing, and it sucks just as bad! It's gritty, muddy, and sketchy, like this was drawn by someone with a splotchy broken pen, and a shitty photoshop program! Some may find it merely mediocre, or ok (and it is better in some places than others), but I don't take to muddy art on the best of days! What's worse is the inconsistency, as other moments more resemble the more normal art style of previous issues.

The covers are crap! #13X's is a total non-sequitur, the one to #16 is the best drawn, but lacks a background, while the covers to #13 and #14 almost look good (#14's looks very stylish), but are dragged down by the shitty, smudgy-gritty artwork, and #15's is confusing! I originally thought it was a non-sequitur, with two trucker crims getting the drop on Shadowman, but actually, they're Abbettors, who actually show up in the comic! The art is so bad that the guy's grey hair looks like a trucker hat!

I'll give Shadowman's new creative team only two compliments. One, Punk Mambo is an interesting an amusing character, and I'm glad she's getting her own one-shot later this year, and Two, they actually bothered to have Voodoo in the series that's meant to be about Voodoo! While Voodoo is stated to be the core of magic in this universe, nothing has ever been drawn from Voodoo mythology or lore, aside from Baron Samedi, and occasional uses of the word veve. Here, they namedrop a few words like wanga and mambo, introduce rogue Loas, and a Voodoo pantheon known as The Mysteries. Does it utilize them well? Hell no, but it did at least try, and for a Shadowman series, that's a more impressive feat than you know (the original series had no Voodoo elements, despite that supposedly being crucial). For example, the Shadowman power was continually called a Loa in previous issues of this series, but at no point was it actually a Loa. The new creative team are actually treating it like one, but it was never meant to be a Loa, so the problem still stands (also, I know that the power talks at the end of Issue #1, and no, it didn't make sense there either!).

Valiant Comics' shared universe normally keeps its continuity straight, but between Eternal Warrior, and Shadowman, it takes a beating! Thankfully Shadowman's ruination is only affecting itself, unlike how Eternal Warrior's brazen fuckups have ruined everything in continuity about the character of Gilad and the Geomancers. Even ignoring the huge continuity errors, this isn't a good storyline of Shadowman. It's total rubbish! Thankfully it has at least a few small positives, including a happy ending, which I appreciate, as opposed to a grim dark depressing mess for an ending...This positive conclusion doesn't last however, as this new creative team hasn't quite pummeled Shadowman into the ground yet. That's in the miniseries End Times, and believe me, I'll be having words about that!...