More violence, little plot.
Creative Staff:
Story: Declan Shalvey, Fred Van Lente
Art: Vincenzo Carratu, Pasquale Qualano
Colors: Kike J. Diaz
Letterer: Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou
What They Say:
Vampirella hurtles through space, unaware of the dangers that lurk within the universe. An evil grows on Mars. And Red Sonja discovers an awful secret…
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The opening installment of this miniseries was certainly fun in a basic kind of way as we got introduced to a range of Dynamite characters as they were exposed to the virus and violence or had it explained that it was coming. Declan Shalvey and Fred Van Lente are some of my favorite writers with various projects over the years and working together here they have plenty of toys to play with. Or, well, too many toys because this issue is just like the previous one except that it adds a few more characters into the mix. Which at least gives Carratu and Qualano more to illustrate and that works for me as there’s a great range to work with when it comes to this cast.
The premise is solid enough but what we get are a series of disconnected vignettes as the violence and infections play out. Vampirella’s story moves forward a touch here as she investigates outside of the show because of boredom only to discover one of the instigating creatures is out there as well, and that the ship itself has a crew of infected. That has the scout ship being pushed off into what’s really going to be a fatal orbital insertion, but there’ll be a twist there to keep her alive. We also get a little more time with Red Sonja as she’s in her time dealing with the undead there, but at least getting a little help from the smiley face button guy thing that tells her he knows the way to make this work and survive. It’s not bad but it’s a slim segment that at least moves Sonja to a new spot.
Where this book interested me a bit more was that we got to check in with Miss Fury at the retirement home. She knew something bad would be coming into the world once again and she’s got the old costume out, a cat at hand, and is doing her best to stay alive even as the rest of the house falls to the undead. Of course, things get wonky when the Project: Superpowers group shows up but I know almost none of these characters and it’s just an aggressive and unfriendly team, one that certainly isn’t friendly toward Miss Fury. This just provides a point for new infections becuase overconfident and cocky superheroes are prime super spreaders and they’ve even called that pretty openly as Peter Thunderbolt is showing up to this event to try and stave off bad things.
In Summary:
DIE!namite continues to be not-bad but it’s not terribly engaging either with what it’s doing. The right things are here but the execution is just spending most of its time moving from separate storyline to separate storyline for a few pages. Yes, we know it’ll all connect eventually and all that jazz. But it’s not a strong narrative for the second of five issues in order to make it compelling to read. Visually, it’s great to see what’s going on here and these particular interpretations of the characters which are definitely their own thing in some cases. Plus, I love anytime the Dynamite folks remember Miss Fury exists.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 15+
Released By: Dynamite Entertainment
Release Date: November 11th, 2020
MSRP: $3.99
