Rapid Reviews - 8 October 2003 - Part IV

1602 Part One: "For a whole week the skies over London have been blood red at noon..." So starts the mini-series that everyone seems to be talking about. And yes, we finally succumbed to the draw and bought it for ourselves. Lucky our retailer had all three issues so far, or we would have stuck to our original plan and bought the trade when it came out. So, what did I think? It was fascinating. You all know I love Elseworlds, and this comes across as the ultimate in Marvel Elseworlds, with the added twist of it supposedly being in continuity. So what is the key? Which characters match modern ones? While this issue is all set-up, I was impressed by how many characters were fit in, and how well I was able to identify them, despite not being a big Marvel fan, without the help of Jess Nevins' Annotations.

1602 Part Two: Interesting how the front cover has a maze, and who should be in the center? Yes, Virginia, there is a key to this tale. Beast is one of my favorite characters of the Marvel Universe, and he shows up early in this issue. As for the rest, the mystery deepens. There is clearly something up with Ms Dare, but what? Who is she? Jess Nevins' Annotations.

1602 Part Three: So I hear of some people being proud that they managed to stop themselves from picking up this issue. I'm not sure why, as this is the most interesting one yet, bringing in The Watcher, even! The mystery surrounding Dare continues to build, as she must be the key, but how? This is a very Neil Gaiman-like book, and I'm enjoying it quite a bit. Jess Nevins' Annotations.

If the above links to Jess' annotations don't work, try the mirror site.

Still to review: Fallen Angel, World's Best Sampler, Crossovers and El Cazador.