REVIEW: X-O Manowar #43 â€œThe Kill Listâ€

Written by Robert Venditti
Art by Robert Gill
Published by Valiant Entertainment

X-O Manowar is the story about a man named Aric of Dacia who was captured by an alien race called the Vine who came to Earth to enslave the humans and make the planet their own. Aric escapes slavery by rebelling and gets hold of a sentient power suit called Shanhara, a being worshipped by the Vine as a deity, and with the suit returned to Earth. Once there he finds out that centuries have passed and the world he left was gone. Now with the power suit Shanhara he finds a new purpose as the protector of the fragile planet he has come home to.

Even as he helps to rebuild this once thriving planet he finds he must broker a new peace with refugees of the Vine alien race whom are already living there and wish to continue to co-exist along with the human population. There are also factions of the Vine who are half human and half Vine and are disguised to look like humans. They have their own special interests separate from the rest, a hidden agenda where they want to transform the planet for their own and no one else. Aric must somehow stop the Vine who walks amongst the population in disguise before another intergalactic war breaks out between the humans and the Vine.

As you can see there is a good amount of back story to take in here and the author seems to do a good job of bringing you up to speed in the beginning of this issue. So if this is your first time reading X-O Manowar you won“t be too in the dark. The story begins with a prelude to something that is supposed to happen later in the story which threw me off just a little but by the end I could understand why they did it. Their use of visual referencing to tell the story was spot on and one could really feel like they were getting involved in the story the more I read. The artwork and coloring were consistent and I appreciated the quality detailed work that went into it.

All in all X-O Manowar #43 is well put together comic book. The artwork is tight and writing is well done. I know that if you pick up a copy that you probably become addicted to its storyline and want to follow the exploits of Aric the noble Visigoth warrior of Dacia.

[yasr_overall_rating size=”large”]