Written by: Brian Wood
Art by: Garry Brown
Publisher: Image Comics
I’m not sure I really like Black Road, which might seem silly since I’m about to give Issue #3 a good score. I gave the first two issues good scores as well. There’s just something about this comic that I’m finding hard to get engaged with, something missing that I wish were present.
Make no mistake, the comic is good—I believe each issue is achieving what it wants to achieve—but if this were the last issue, cliffhanger and all, I wouldn’t much care.
At any rate, Magnus and that girl whose name I still don’t remember continue their journey. The comic opens with them being attacked by wolves, proving that the Black Road isn’t just dangerous because wayward thieves and blood-thirsty religious zealots patrol it. Even nature herself is harsher here.
The comic does that little dance where it starts with action and then cuts away to “Earlier” before the action is concluded. I’ve always found this a bit of a cheap kind of setup for tension, to be honest, but once the shock wears off, we dive into some nice character moments between our two protagonists.
What is perhaps most impressive is how little dialogue there is in this issue. Almost every bit of character development delivered is shown through actions and facial expressions, with only one little bit of exposition to round things off in the middle of the issue. That’s a confidence here I greatly respect. It can be hard to shut your characters up when you want to really build them up.
On the art front, the comic looks great. I love the style to it, and I love the use of color. It’s not the prettiest comic out there, but the story is far from pretty. The art fits.
I wish Black Road would captivate me more, would make me adore it like so many other Image comics I read, but it has yet to do that. I will, however, keep chugging along with it. The quality is perhaps too high to miss out on.
