Most of you reading this blog have probably never heard of Red Knight before. In fact, you've probably never heard of Justin Cristelli or Primal Paper Comics before either. I won't hold it against you because Primal Paper Comics is a small publisher and Justin Cristelli has never worked for any of the major comic book publishers before. However, if you watched Geekvolution on YouTube in the early to mid 2010s then you might recognize the name, The Real Manos, a YouTuber who collaborated with Captain Logan on the channel numerous times from about 2011 until 2016 or 2017. The Real Manos is Justin Cristelli and these days he's working on republishing Red Knight under his own company, Manos Publishing.
I first heard about Red Knight when Captain Logan reviewed the first three issues on an episode of Geekvolution's comic book review show, The Comic Vault with another long time partner, Dan Torrey, back when most of the shows on Geekvolution were in podcast form. I thought it was a really cool concept and I bought four issues. Unfortunately the first issue was out of print as were issue #'s 4 and 6. There were only seven issues out at that point in 2015 when I got them, so I bought issues 2, 3, 5 and 7. I reviewed all four issues on the original Geek Outpost blog, the predecessor to the original Review Basement Word Press blog. As a thank you for reviewing the books, Justin sent me a PDF digital copy of Red Knight #1 so I could eventually review the entire first arc, which spanned the first three issues. Sadly I don't have that digital copy anymore as it was on my old HP Netbook which died before I could transfer it over to my external hard drive. But during my comic book purges of 2015 and 2016 I kept all four issues that I'd bought from Justin.
Despite it being the second issue of the series, and the middle part of a three part story arc, Red Knight #2 is actually a pretty great jumping on point if you were unfortunate enough to have missed the first issue. Justin made sure there was a previously section as a summary for readers to be caught up before reading the issue. The two main characters are Todd McClain, who takes on the mantle of Red Knight to fight crime in Norfolk, Virginia during a time when superheroes are illegal, outside of a group of government sanctioned ones, and Detective Martha Brown who works for the Norfolk Police Department. After an attempt at stopping supervillains goes wrong, Martha arrests Todd's friends/partners Ben Lee a.k.a. Nonstop and Wendy Harper a.k.a. Fireball for violation of the anti vigilante/superhero laws that are in effect.
One of the things that I like about this series in general and this issue in particular is the humour that Justin injected into his writing. For example, there's a scene where Todd and his uncle, Nathan, are in the alleyway behind the bar that Todd owns and runs and Nathan unveils the Red Knight Mobile, and Todd points out that it's just his dad's old moving van. Nathan then remarks that it's easier to conceal than a fancy red sports car would be in the event that the cops were chasing them. This is a gentle nudge at the fact that Batman drives around in a car that was designed to resemble a bat on wheels.
I also like and appreciate that Justin wrote Todd as an old-fashioned superhero with morals and ethics who doesn't kill the criminals he catches. Too often superheroes have become just costumed vigilantes who kill and maim the bad guys in modern comics, and so it's even more refreshing now in 2020 than it even would've been in 2011 when this issue came out to have a new superhero who doesn't kill.
The artwork is a bit on the rough side of things. Being a completely independent book, Justin couldn't hire a colourist, so the book is in black and white, except for the front cover. The artist, JC Grande is pretty good. The art is minimalistic, because again, it's an extremely independent comic published by a small comic book publisher not associated by any of the bigger independent publishers. But the art style actually fits the story that Justin is trying to tell here.
The original Primal Paper Comics release of Red Knight #2 is no longer available for purchase. However, last year Justin relaunched the entire Red Knight series directly through Manos Publishing and if I'm not mistaken he has a colourist who coloured JC Grande's artwork. I'll leave a link to the Manos Publishing website where you can find the three issues that are out so far. The first three issues were also collected into a trade paperback collected edition, Red Knight: A Knight Without a Sword that is still available through Amazon and has an introduction written by Captain Logan of Geekvolution.
Final Thoughts and Rating: Overall I think Red Knight #2 is a wonderful comic book. I'm not usually a fan of independent comics like this as I feel that no matter what they tend not to be up to the quality of the larger independent books and there isn't much to sink my teeth into. Red Knight is completely different and I'm glad that I at least have four issues of the series in my comic book collection. I'm giving Red Knight #2 10/10 stars because it's fun, it's funny, it's exciting and it doesn't leave you lost if you didn't get to read the first issue.
Manos Publishing Website: https://www.manospublishing.com/products
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