Mutated animal hybrids? Check. Dragons? Check. Badass fight scenes? Gratuitous check. Dragon Resurrection is a comic by co-writers Mark Byers, Lin Zhang, and Lyan Zhang (who seem conspicuously absent from the internet) about a girl and her twin brother who are working together to unlock the ancient potential of dragons with the modern science of genetics. But, as always with any such story, there is an evil, grey haired military general looking to raise an army of dragon warriors. We’ll talk about everything I loved, and the few things that made me shudder in horror.
The art is the first thing that MUST be mentioned for this comic. It’s fabulous. The cover (left) is just a taste of the delicious art in this comic. Admittedly, the cover is by Vosa Wang, but Erfan Fajar‘s work in the main body of the comic is no less impressive. In the first couple pages, we get a brief history of the legend of dragons used in this world, and there is some armor that has such beautiful, graceful details that I want every D&D character I ever play to have their own set. The genetic experiments, both failed and successful, are beautifully done. The scenery is gorgeous as well, which usually receives minimal effort from an artist. I would buy this book just to stare at the art.
That’s not to say the story isn’t good. In fact, I found it very compelling with characters having understandable motivations. Even the somewhat unusual goals of the bad guy are reasonably explained. I do wish more was explained about the twin’s father, because he is a decently significant character and yet, I’m not even 100% what his job is (Archeologist? Historian? Maybe?). That being said, I feel like we do get a working understanding of the twins’ background, and they are of course the main characters, Jesse somewhat more than Jack.
I think it’s also very interesting how they touch on a key point of perspective: modern (or rather somewhat futuristic) technology is actually much more of a match for ancient mystical powers than we usually portray it. Think of it this way: one thing that got people declared witches centuries ago was their ability to heal others with unexplained concoctions, yet these same brews would be no match for modern medicine and a typical hospital. At the time, it seemed potent, but that was compared to what was available at the time. The comic becomes a grand battle between a man with super high tech gadgets and one with ancient dragon powers. It’s a fairly even match, which I think is a more realistic portrayal of how such things would really play out.
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| Taken from http://www.darkhorse.com |
I have to complain about, well, words. The letting is done by Nate Piekos, who runs a digital font site, and yet, his lettering is often hard to read, and letters will sometimes run together. It’s not as bad with English words, because with the familiarity of being a native speaker, er… reader, one can figure out what’s being said pretty easily. But with Chinese names and words that are sprinkled throughout by the Jesse and Jack, as well as their father, it can get a little confusing, and it inadvertently slows down the reading process. But all in all, it’s not that bad of lettering; it just has a few hang ups.
On the other hand, each time the action shifts locations, the latitude and longitude are marked, along with the name of the location. And after about half way through, they’re wrong. Part of Alaska is marked somewhere out past Hawaii, a city in Malawi is placed south of the Cape of Good Hope. Hell, they put the U.S. Pentagon in Quebec! That’s a pretty big screw up, considering that the person who wrote those coordinates got it wrong, and it was then missed by (roughly) at least three other people in the editing/review process. If had happened once, I could understand and say “You know, sometimes thing slip through.” But it happens four times. That’s careless, and on a project this big, they should really be ashamed of themselves.
Despite it’s flaws, it is still a very good read. The comic goes for $17.99, which is a great price. Like I said earlier, this is worth the eighteen bucks just for the art alone, but it’s a pretty good story to boot. A well deserved pat on the back for Mark, Lin and Lyan, a bottle of our finest for Erfan, and a stern, disappointed look for Nate.
Matthew Bryant, aka Baker Street Holmes, is excited that this series will apparently be coming to theaters in Fall 2014, despite the lack on an IMDB page. He loves animated movies. And dragons. And Legends. And boats (unrelated). You can find him on Twitter at @BStreetHolmes or e-mail him at HMCrazySS@gmail.com.
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