Hey guys! How's it going? I'm doing pretty well. Today I'm going to be reviewing an interesting comic book. It's halfway a What-If? scenario, half a continuation of a beloved 90s animated series. It's issue #1 of Gargoyles, published in 2006 by SLG Comics. Let's get into it.
Gargoyles has the distinction of being one of the only comic book series, if not the only comic book series, to be written by the creator of the TV series it's adapting. In most cases that would be really cool, however in this instance it might actually be a detriment to the book and to the show itself. Series creator, Greg Weisman, has never liked the fact that Disney continued Gargoyles (with The Goliath Chronicles) without him. And it's no wonder since they actually removed all of the elements that made the first two seasons of the show so successful. The serialized storytelling, the influences from the works of Shakespeare, and characters like Macbeth were removed entirely while both Demona and Xanatos had reduced roles, probably because their voice actors, Jonathan Frakes and Marina Sirtis, were busy with Star Trek: First Contact and Star Trek: Insurrection at the time. So I think this comic is just Greg Weisman being petty because this issue and the next are just an adaptation of the first episode of The Goliath Chronicles, "The Journey". Having said that it's a pretty first issue.
Following the events of "Hunter's Moon", the three part finale of season 2, the Manhattan Clan, led by Goliath, has formed an alliance with former enemy, David Xanatos, and have returned to their ancestral home, Castle Wyvern, which sits on top of Xanatos's Eyrie Building in New York City. However, the existence of the Gargoyles has been revealed to the world due to someone catching them evacuating the Clock Tower in "Hunter's Moon". Of course, they've revealed themselves to many people over the course of the first two seasons, so why this is the time where they're "unveiled" to the world is beyond me. Much like how Rocky, Adam and Aisha are the first ones to find out the identity of the Power Rangers in the second season of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers when they regularly call each other by name in front of other people. Trust me I will get to that. Anyway, due to their existence being revealed, the Gargoyles are now being hunted by a group of radicals known as the Quarrymen, led by John Castaway, who spread fear and hate towards the beings who have saved the world numerous times from people like Demona and Xanatos. There's some speculation that Castaway is secretly John Canmore, the last surviving Hunter, who have been trying to kill Demona for close to a thousand years, because she was a jerk once upon a time and caused the death of a guy.
Goliath goes to visit Elisa so they can go on their date, because for some reason Weisman decided that it would be a good idea for the two to act on their feelings for each other, despite them being of two different species. Huh, I'm just beginning to realize that this was apparently a thing in the 90s, because K.A. Applegate did this with Rachel and Tobias in Animorphs about the time the TV show version of this issue aired. Anyway, the Quarrymen show up while Goliath is turned to stone, and once he awakens he and Elisa go on the run, and that's the end of the issue.
Yeah, not a whole lot actually happens in this issue. But that's what happens when you turn a 30 minute TV episode into a comic book, you have to split it into two issues where the first issue is just setup. It's better than what Marvel did back in the 90s.
In 1995 (though some sources say 1994), not long after the TV series started airing, Marvel Comics began publishing a comic book series that was actually darker in tone than the TV series, because 90s Marvel was all about darkness and incessant violence. And as you can tell from the cover of the first issue, the covers were just as ridiculous as any other Marvel Comics book being produced at the time. Of course, the series didn't last long, while the Marvel Comics section of the Gargoyles Wikipedia article states that Marvel's filing for bankruptcy is what caused the cancellation of the book, I don't think that's likely since the comic ended a year before Marvel filed for bankruptcy, so I'm pretty sure that ratings were down because nobody wanted to read this series when the TV series source material was superior to it in every way.
So this first issue of the SLG series is way better than the Marvel series ever could be. And to bring this back to the Power Rangers for a minute, the same thing happened with Marvel's Mighty Morphin Power Rangers comic book series, which was also coming out around this same time. But still the artwork on this book is okay, there's just a few places where it looks REALLY bad because you can't see a character's face properly as if you were filming something but the autofocus was on and it kept focusing on the background behind you or something like that.
The series does get better, including the artwork, as it goes along. About ten years ago I was borrowing alot of books from the library since I didn't have this blog yet and there was nothing else to keep me occupied during the day. So at one point I borrowed both trade paperback volumes that collected this series, and the first (and only volume) of the spin-off series, Gargoyles: Bad Guys, which is a Suicide Squad-esque series featuring the Pack and a few other villains teaming up for missions. So I was able to catch up on the series since I haven't been able to find the other issues in the series, and yes it does get better. It's just there's no real difference between this issue and the first half of the episode it's adapting.
Aside from the artwork, the only thing that bugs me is a section where Goliath is relating the history of the Manhattan Clan from it's beginnings in 994 A.D. when they were part of the clan at Castle Wyvern, through to the current situation with the Quarrymen, even though Elisa knows the 994 A.D. part of their history AND WAS THERE for the rest of it! I get it's supposed to be a way to give readers the history of the series, and to incorporate the season 2 opening theme narration, but people who bought this in 2006 know the show already, since the first season and first half of season 2 were already out on DVD by this point, so what was the point of this sequence? It's not in the episode it's adapting, and if you've never seen the TV show then chances are you weren't picking this book up. This book was for the fans and a way for Weisman to finish the series the way HE wanted to finish it, instead of the way Disney finished the series on TV with The Goliath Chronicles back in the 90s.
Unfortunately, I can't really recommend this issue on it's own. If you can find it with issue #2, or better yet in the first trade paperback volume, then you'll get more out of it than if you just read it on it's own. Also, if you're not already a fan of the TV series, then this series isn't for you either, because you really need to know some of the show's history before diving into this book. It's still pretty good, but like I said, it's for fans of the TV show more than it is for the casual comic book reader.
Alright guys that's going to be it for me for today. I'll be back on Saturday with a movie review. So until then have a wonderful night tonight and a wonderful day tomorrow and I will talk to you all later. Take care.
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