Review of a Free Comic Book Day issue
Mass Effect
He Who Laughs Best
Story: Mac Walters and Jeremy Barlow
Script: Jeremy Barlow
Art: Garry Brown
Colors: Michael Atiyeh
Letters: Michael Heisler
The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys
Dead Satellites
Script: Gerard Way and Shaun Simon
Art: Becky Cloonan
Colors: Dan Jackson
Letters: Nate Piekos of Blambott
R.I.P.D.
For Fear, They Mirror True
Script: Jeremy Barlow
Art: Tony Parker
Colors: Michelle Madsen
Letters: Richard Starkings and Comicraft
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics Inc.
On Sale: May 4, 2013
Price: Free
Format: Full Color
Three blockbuster titles fill this FCBD offering! In R.I.P.D., a séance goes terribly wrong! Then, in Mass Effect, follow a flight-school grad as he breaks the rules to prove himself in space! Finally, check out the police-state landscape of the highly anticipated miniseries The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys!
Getting to check out three stories in one book and all for free is one of the cool parts of Free Comic Book Day. When these stories are ones you might not normally pick up simply from the preconceived notion that they are not the type of stories you would enjoy, well that is an added benefit. If you haven’t guessed it yet, the stories in this book are ones that normally I might have bypassed as I was making my comic book purchasing decisions. There are so many great books out there that when a book has a cover or title that doesn’t make you think it is one that suits your tastes you might not even pick it up and flip it open. This is not to say the covers on this book were well done. (It is a flip book so both front and back are front cover material.) Nor is it to say the titles are not good. It is simply that when I have a certain amount of money to spend, it makes a difference how quickly a cover and title grab my attention. Keep in mind that others will most likely have gravitated to these instead of the ones that might draw me in, as they are good covers/titles.
Now how to talk about three different stories in one review. This should be fun.
All three stories were a fun read. I was most pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed them all. These are all written by writers I am not currently familiar with and it is always a pleasure to find writers you have not previously read that can deliver a good story. To find three stories, written by different writers, in one comic book and have them all deliver, that is a win and is a credit to the publisher and editors to have put together such a great combination. Each story is different, not just in tale but in genre and themes. Yet they work in this book.
The artist for each story delivered a style of art that was well suited to the story being told. This is inclusive of the colorists work on each story. The tones set by the art and colors was in keeping with the story being told by the writers. Again having all three components work on one story is a success, to have three stories each with a different team and each deliver at this quality impressed me. I will confess I expected to be disappointed by at least one team so am very pleased with what I saw between the pages of this book.
Overall, would I recommend this book to a friend? Yes, as a way to check out three stories that they might have passed by otherwise I would definitely suggest they read this book. Thank you Dark Horse for exposing me to some stories I might otherwise never have checked out.
Now for my one complaint, three great stories in one comic meant that all three were quite short. Obviously if this is my complaint it meant I was enjoying them and they ended to soon.
Final Score: 8/10
