A little father and daughter time.
Creative Staff:
Story: Sean Lewis
Art: Antonio Fuso
Letterer: Dave Sharpe
What They Say:
Your favorite medieval pair get into darker musings as Finola and Cillian find themselves face-to-face with the Ancient Dearg of Celtic myth. These powerful forefathers to Vampires do not take kindly to strangers, and especially not strangers who want to murder them dead. Meanwhile, Balor’s whispers continue to play on Padraig the Grotesque as his daughters and kingdom wonder how long they can live in fear of a madman.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Clankillers continues to barrel through things at a pretty strong pace, which I suspect will work really well in trade form as opposed to the monthly circuit. I’m digging what Sean Lewis is doing on the individual issue level but I know the gaps between installments makes it hard to really feel the flow of it as a whole. That said, it’s got some powerful moments that connect and Antonio Fuso is just nailing issue after issue with a great look to it. The weirdness of the various creatures in the clans, the harshness of the people themselves, and the kind of intense and hollow look to a lot of the knights and soldiers gives it all a very distinctive feeling that makes it stand out.
With this installment things go badly for the deargs/vampires at first with Finola and her crew giving them a hard run, destroying the clan quicker than anyone expected save the one that they need to bring back for proof. What we get here is something with a good sense of power behind it combined with the kind of humor that Finola brings to it, such as slicing a vampire in half and then standing on the bottom half as it stands in order to see more of the battlefield. It’s not an overly detailed piece in terms of story and character when it comes to the deargs but it shows her butchering another blan and preparing for what’s next. Unfortunately, she’s not quite able to get to the next as her father shows up, though I’m amused that she sent Cillian along to handle it with the others as there’s such implicit trust there.
The encounter with her father, Padraig, is definitely intriguing and plays out in two ways. In the forefront we get to see her needling him with commentary and pushing him and the knights that came with him, though they’re not keen on just how bad this is all going to go. Padraig is in full on god-mode in his mind and playing to that which makes for a very dark encounter between the two. At the same time we get to see the machinations going on back at the castle where we get pushes by some of those outside of the family telling the other sisters that their father has gone too far and it’s all going to fall apart within the kingdom unless they do something. There’s a good sense that a lot more chaos is going to come into play here and Finola’s position is going to be even more uncertain.
In Summary:
Clankillers is working better for me than I expected in some ways but it definitely has a rough time in the monthly format simply because of how the story is tied together. Events have been building well so far now that Finola is on her mission and I really like the dynamic between her and the others like Cillian as well as what we get with her father here as she knows all the buttons to push. A lot of what’s driving it is also the great artwork from Fuso as it has a certain rawness and roughness to it that really speaks for the time and place it takes place in. I’m excited to see what’s next but really looking forward to when it can be read in full.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: AfterShock Comics
Release Date: September 5th, 2018
MSRP: $3.99
