JustFocus continues to make you discover this series too little known. X-O Manowar is published by Bliss comics. After our review of the complete and first volume of the relaunch, does X-O Manowar maintain the level of excellence of the first volume?
A harmonious waltz of designers
Matt Kindt who we could read on Eternity and on the first volume is in charge of all eight episodes that make up this collection. Four designers with very different styles follow one another but the whole remains coherent because each designer is in charge of a different part of the overall story. Clayton Crain's dark, modern digital painting style reinforces the epic side of battles with ships hurtling towards monoliths. Renato Guedes makes a separate story about a group of bounty hunters who come to Gorin to kill Aric. We follow with great pleasure a story of escape in the present and fight for survival in the past. Guedes uses watercolor painting that is both very precise and blurred. We feel an influence of the science fiction comic of the seventies. Ryan Bodenheim (The Dying & The Dead) picks up the story when the narrative returns to Gorin. His sense of movement during combat makes the story very dynamic.
A farmer turned general
In the previous volume, Aric had fled Earth for obscure reasons. Stripped of his armor, he lived a simple life as a farmer on Gorin, but the war on his new planet pushed him back to arms. Rising through the ranks, the barbarian became an essential part of the emperor's strategy to conquer the planet. Faced with mounting threats, Aric found himself forced to use the armor again. In this volume, mysterious monoliths have appeared and the war resumes.
A Parable of American Foreign Policy
Aric dreams of being the hero of a victorious epic that would impose peace on the entire planet. Aric refuses to delegate because he is convinced that others will be corrupted by power. This vision closely resembles the U.S. strategy in the Middle East. But, as in this complex region, this beautiful project is doomed from the outset to failure. The coming to power of our hero destabilizes the previous balance and reinforces internal conflicts. Kindt manages very well to create different peoples who, once in power, have great difficulty getting along.
To achieve this noble goal, he takes more and more power but so must wear more and more armor. By its power, X-O Manowar is reminiscent of Superman but a superhero who would assume his role of leader. Without armor he is full of scars and penguin. He cannot live in his armor and therefore calls him. Like a drug addict, he is addicted but wants to get out of it. For more discretion, Aric has changed the armor into a ring and he talks to her. We see the link with Golum in The Lord of the Rings.
A quality edition
Like each volume of this passionate publisher, the bonuses are numerous with all the covers, the design work of the characters or the prison planet, two short texts where Matt Kindt explains his motivations for taking over X-O Manowar, sketches of Crain and Bodenheim.
The rest of the series is therefore like the first volume: one of the best current series. Matt Kindt constructs a fun but also profound narrative. It creates a whole planet by giving a very pessimistic image about politics. Each artist brings his style and, far from disturbing the reader, this waltz allows him to discover draftsmen of great talent. Now back on Earth, Aric seems even more disillusioned than before. The reader is excited about him while waiting for the sequel in January 2019.
