REVIEW: Future Primitive #4 (of 5)

This weeks sees the penultimate issue of the “alternative history” book, Future Primitive from  Markosia, with various fractions and sub plots coming to a head, with Kulkan the warrior king of the Neanderthal Skybearers and Zotol meeting with the legendary Aegyptian Zakol.

Writer Kevin Gunstone clearly has a passion for alternative history;  the preface showing research that prompted specific issues shown in this issue.  It’s great to see someone follow their passion, however, the things I feared after reviewing the last issue, seem to have come to pass.  I would have hoped that as we are four issues into a five issue series that we wouldn’t still need the huge amount of exposition that is prevalent in this book.  It’s as if Gunstone is more interested on promoting his ideas rather than use them to propel the story forward.  Looking at the book, the layout of the amount of word balloons, clutters the page and unfortunately, just plain bored me with its chewing the scenery style.

Slobodan Jovanovic returns on art with a hard sell.  How does he manage to let his art speak for itself when it is constantly layered under mounds of dialogue?  Still, there are panels that allows Jovanovic to cut loose, especially toward the end of the book.  Returning colorist Stefan Mrkonjic applied his magic across the panels.  The muted look from last issue is still in play, but when asked to produce a more colourful scheme, the difference is quite striking.

As stated, it is obvious Kevin Gunstone loves this topic and he has done well to inspire fellow contributors to produce this book.  But where this book falls down, is that is comes across more like a history text-book rather than an entertaining comic book.  I think Gunstone would be better served with a stronger editor who would help cut out some of the stuff that Gunstone loves in order to present a more structured and concise storytelling method.

Author Profile

Johnny "The Machine" Hughes

I am a long time comic book fan, being first introduced to Batman in the mid to late 70's. This led to a appreciation of classic artists like Neal Adams and Jim Aparo. Moving through the decades that followed, I have a working knowledge of a huge raft of characters with a fondness for old school characters like JSA and The Shadow

Currently reading a slew of Bat Books, enjoying a mini Marvel revival, and the host of The Definative Crusade and Outside the Panels whilst also appearing on No-Prize Podcast on the Undercover Capes Podcast Network

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