Written by: Leo
Illustrations: Icar
Coloring: Florence Spiteri
Publisher: Dargaud
De Laatste Grens Episode 2 – Comic Book Review
With technology booming the way it does, it might not be unthinkable that mankind will one day live on a different planet. A planet where we can start over, and hopefully do better. Unfortunately we are only human, and just like on planet Tau Ceti 5, that might cause us to do damage once again. At least, that is what seems to be happening over there.
On planet Tau Ceti 5 there is a small town called Erechim, which is about the furthest point on the planet where mankind has ever come. In this town, Mr. Burton lives, who owns most of the land surrounding the city, but still he scares his neighbors off to gain their land too. The people in the town don’t feel safe anymore because of Mr. Burton’s gang, and they start to wonder why he so desperately wants all that land. When, to top things off, they spot a giant monster, they decide to call in the help of Jane and John Jones. John moves around in a ‘locomobile’, a fancy wheelchair, as he is disabled. Nonetheless, this locomobile is quite high tech, actually giving him many advantages. When out of the blue Alexei Lavinsky arrives, who tells them that his friend Julio Montez is missing, they start investigating his disappearance, while at the same time still focusing on their surveillance of Mr. Burton. They soon find out that Mr. Montez rented a quad and drove out of the city, up to the borders of Mr. Burton’s land. But when Jane, John and Alexei go and investigate, they get caught by his men. Mr. Burton releases them immediately after he sees who they are, but with this, Jane gets even more suspicious of him. What she doesn’t know is that she is right to be so suspicious, as Mr. Burton seems to be doing all kinds of dodgy experiments on a secret location.
In this second issue of the series, the duo Jane and John try to dig deeper into the secrets of Mr. Burton. Leo starts off in the middle of an action scene, but as that leads to nothing, soon a new storyline pops up, the one with Alexei, to give the whole story a bit more depth. Nonetheless, it seems like this depth will only be fully explored in the next few issues to come. The story doesn’t move that fast, and apart from Mr. Montez’ disappearance, there doesn’t seem to be much progress in the investigation, even with the high tech equipment they use. On the other hand, there are some small things happening, which will probably be more relevant later on in the series.
Icar uses bold black lines for his illustrations, which makes everything look a bit harsh and stiff at times. On the other hand, the surroundings do look nice, showing many unearthly landscapes that will tickle your imagination. Florence Spiteri opted for light colors which get more faded when used further in the background, to create some more depth.
Conclusion
De Laatste Grens Episode 2 continues the story of Jane and John trying to find out what shady business Mr. Burton is involved in. The story gets an extra dimension with the disappearance of Mr. Montez, but it seems that this issue was used to introduce some more aspects to the case, rather than to get closer to the truth. The illustrations show a nice looking science-fiction world, while the story feels a bit more realistic, most of the time that is. We’re curious where this story will be going in the next few issues.
De Laatste Grens Episode 2 - Comic Book Review,
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