REVIEW: Swords of Sorrow #5

Cover A Main: Tula Lotay
Cover B Variant: Emanuela Lupacchino
Writer: Gail Simone
Art: Sergio Davila

Behind a very stylish cover by Tula Lotay, lies a pretty basic comic book.

One of the longest crossovers continues interminably to itsÂ world resetting conclusion.Â In this issue, the heroines formulate a plan in which toÂ save their worlds andÂ Snow White, by defeating Prince Charming.Â However, there are doubts on both sides; can those be relied on to overcome their fears and desires in order to win the day for their fraction?

Now I am a big Gail Simone fan, but as this series has continued my interest has waned.Â I have said before that there is a lack of character interaction in the main book, which fans would say that is what the one shots and other mini series were for.Â The problem for the main book, is that those books have not been consistent.Â Simone, therefore, has a cast of ciphers to deal with and despite being aware of how characters have interacted in their own books, hasn’t been able to transfer those elements into her book.Â In addition, the cast is now huge which means that inevitably, some of the characters are going to be the Deanna Troi of the group.Â Dialogue is a strength of Simone’s and I did smile at the Simon and Garfunkel reference whether it was intended or not.

The art is by the usual crew for this book, Sergio Davila on illustrations, Jorge Sutil on colors and pretty much, my previous comments are still valid in this issue.Â Davila works well when working on close-ups, focusing on faces or larger body panels.Â Where the art suffers is in the group panels.Â This has been a consistent problem for the book.Â Another consistency, although a much better one, has been Sutils colors.Â Looking at the pages with full bleeds mainly,Â giving the impression of the doom that is that is the end of the world.

This whole cross-over event started out really strongly.Â Whether its story compression, the multitude of tie-ins or the quality of the books, somewhere along the way, I have lost interest.Â It’s a shame, the cross-over should be enticing me to try out theÂ characters books.Â Â If I was a paying customer, I don’t think that goal would have worked.Â However, as a reviewer, I can see that the main Red Sonja book and Vampirella book is lot better than this hodgepodge casserole of story.

[yasr_overall_rating size=”large”]

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