Written by: Marc Legendre
Animations: Charel Cambré
Publisher: Standaard Uitgeverij
De Kronieken van Amoras: De Zaak Krimson #1 – Comic Book Review
It’s hard to believe that our journey through the adventure of Amoras, the adult ‘Suske and Wiske’ already ended in 2015. While the pitch-black storyline surfaced more than often in our minds, even after the sad, yet grand finale, we could only hope to ever see the series come back to life. Now, we get to experience Amoras once again, albeit in the form of side-stories or prequels. This time we get a chance to see how the main villain, Krimson, turned into the evildoer he is today. We were eager to dive into the first part of three of the Amoras Chronicles about Krimson.
It’s hard to write a lot of the story portion of this first part of the chronicles that revolve around Krimson, as his past is only shown at the end of this album, which is clearly an indication that you’ll get the ‘full monty’ during the course of the next issue. That being said, this issue is pretty much about how torn up our world has ended up today, and how Suske, Wiske and the rest of the troop of do-gooders are coping with the inflation of prices, and having to live with less. When Barabas is thinking of how he can change the world for the better, by pretty much stopping Krimson at an earlier point in his life, he learns that Lambik knew the villain a lot before the rest of the group did. Nobody ever truly gave it any thought, but now it might be Lambik who holds the key to Krimson’s conversion to the dark side. The good professor then decides to ask Lambik directly, but the stubborn loudmouthed buffoon doesn’t want to give the professor what he wants, and he decides to bail and go on a drinking spree, which is an indication that Lambik clearly has something to hide.
The flow of this album isn’t immediately what you’d expect, as the original Amoras series was action packed. This first part of the Krimson chronicles takes it a tad slower, and doesn’t immediately dive into the backstory of the short-tempered criminal mastermind, as it’s clear they want to set the proper atmosphere first, by emphasizing the current crisis that is going on in our world, be it by terrorist attacks and inflation of the prices of oil and other commodities, often under the influence of none other than Krimson. That being said, the emotions we felt while reading the main Amoras series immediately resurfaced, which shows that Marc Legendre did a great job building up the story for this spin-off of the initial spin-off series.
Illustration wise things are in sync with the first Amoras albums, which gives us a glimpse of the lives of an adult Suske and Wiske, their loved ones, and a world that is slowly deteriorating. This adult tribute to one of Belgium’s most beloved duos remains astonishing, be it because of the realism of the series, the amount of details, or simply because the stories tend to hit a sensitive note from time to time.
Conclusion
De Kronieken van Amoras: De Zaak Krimson #1 is a great continuation of the Amoras series, albeit in the form of a prequel and side story of said series. We finally get to dive into the psyche of one of Suske and Wiske’s biggest enemies, who clearly had ties to Lambik, prior to becoming the evil villain he is today. While this issue is clearly only the buildup of said ‘origin story’, we were already driven to the edge of our seats. For us, the second issue can’t come soon enough.
De Kronieken van Amoras: De Zaak Krimson #1 - Comic Book Review,
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