A few times each month Mexicus Prime will be teaming up with another member of BSR to review a completely random comic. Top or bottom of the pile; first, last or middle issue of a story arc – literally anything he can get his hands on will be haphazardly reviewed with extreme bias.
DC COMICS THE NEW 52
RED LANTERNS ISSUE #1
BY PETER MILLIGAN, ED BENES , & ROB HUNTER
Mexicus Prime – The splash page on the second page of the comic does a good job describing, or rather, pushing the tone of the weird, fucked up, gratuitous violence that this book delivers. *Spoiler Alert* A Red-Lantern Kitty flying through the cosmos spewing blood out of his mouth. I laughed so hard when I first saw this page! I kept going back to it throughout the read turning to it crying out of laughter and shaking my head saying “WTF?!”
I will start by saying I really enjoyed the art of ED BENES. I thought the panel work was very well done. Silly story aside, I really loved the way the characters in this book were drawn. It reminded me of an IMAGE comics Darkness/Witchblade look mixed with Green Lantern. The panels were really intriguing especially when our lead character ATROCITUS is having his vision of the future to come. Not a comic I could recommend right now. Art alone is not enough of a push to collect this monthly. I want to come back later and see where they’re at with this. Hopefully after this story has been flushed through their system, they can deliver us a little bit more to chew on.
Arse-bot – When Mexicus Prime handed this comic over to me, he simply said, “Wait until you see the first splash page.” Sure enough, upon reading it I was met only a few pages in by a flying Red Lantern cat, spewing blood, and then proceeding to maul a bunch of aliens, one of which he scalps. The whole scene is pretty ridiculous, and while it’s funny, the story didn’t improve much for me as I kept reading.
We learn that our main anti-hero character, Atrocitus, is essentially having problems with the Red Lantern equivalent of erectile dysfunction. He’s lost a lot of his rage and his subordinates seem to be able to sense this and are losing respect for his leadership. This issue goes on to tell the back story of Atrocitus, and he eventually comes to a conclusion about his life’s mission, but questions whether or not his fellow Red Lanterns will follow him.
I’ve never been a huge fan of the Lantern books, and frankly have little to no knowledge of the Red Lanterns. Being that this is a New 52 issue, I was hoping for a little more back story. Readers familiar with the Red Lanterns may enjoy the arc this first issue is clearly setting up, but for me, I am too detached from these character and nothing in this issue sparked an interest to continue on with the series. Blood-spewing Red Lanterns are a pass for me.