After last week's break (or early posting. I guess it depends on your point of view) I found myself struggling a little to get back into a groove.
With literally hundreds of comics which I've yet to read, it was really difficult to just pick something quick and easy. Now, I'm Not sure if I picked something easy exactly but at least I picked something quick.
The Expanse Vol. 1: Origins from Boom Studios is a comic I've had in my Comixology unread list for maybe eighteen months. Being an immense fan of the Amazon Prime show from back when it was on Netflix, this was a comic series I knew I had to pick up, especially when it found itself on heavy sale in the early days of the pandemic.
Written by Hallie Lambert, Georgia Lee and original series creator James S.A.Corey with art by Huang Danlan, colours by Triona Farrell and Juan Useche and letters by Jim Campbell, the Origins volume consists of five issues, each telling an origin story (of sorts) for each of the primary characters; Holden, Naomi, Alex, Amos and Miller. These stories see Holden seeking his place in the galaxy while Naomi attempts to fix herself through the ship she serves on. Meanwhile, Alex tries to choose between two very different lives as Amos attempts to answer his own questions about his actions. Finally, Miller, attempts to help a kindred belter as he attempts to uphold the law on Ceres in the last issue (which, apparently, is only available with this trade).
As I broke this open, I have to confess, I wasn't sure what to expect from this read. Having watched the entirety of the Expanse (well, up to the end of season 5), I felt like I had a pretty good grasp of these characters and their personalities and histories. That said, it's one thing to hear a story and quite another to see it and so, I did hope that these issues would add an extra nugget to flesh the crew of the Rocinante out even further.
Unfortunately, this first volume of the Expanse turned out to be not quite the read I was expecting and, ultimately turned out not to be my thing. That is not to say that the whole series was a complete failure because As I began reading, I found the Holden and Naomi stories really interesting as they showed Holden to always be this hero who is now Captain of the Roci and that his views and direction didn't seem to alter in any way (although I'm curious how he went from this character to the unwilling 2nd officer of the Cant in episode 1). Meanwhile, while not showing the events that changed Naomi's direction as mentioned in the series, this issue was interesting as it showed how she recovered from those events as well as first meeting Amos.
However, the other three issues were really as interesting to me. This is because the Alex issue, while different than the cowboy we've gotten used to in a intriguing take, certainly feels that it retreads old ground given my seeing the later series. Meanwhile, Amos' issue, which had this very surreal psychodelic vibe about it, suffered from this story being a little confusing to me. Finally, the MIller story was a return to normality after issue 4 but struggled to capture me, given MIller's story here a much more boring feel than I ever picked up from the series.
As for the art, I thought it was solid work that made me think it had this Alex + Ada or Manga look to it, although a little more Western in flavour. Sadly, there was very little which really captured me about the work, the exception being the colouring from Triona Farrell and Juan Useche. This is down to Farrell having a very sterile pallette while Useche's seemed somewhat warmer, giving me this cold feeling for the space-based stories while the homebound ones (Mars in particular) felt warmer and, in the case of Amos' 'world' bright and bizarre.
By the end, while I'm glad I finally have gotten The Expanse off of my 'to read' list, I can't lie that I'm a little disappointed with my lack of overall enjoyment given my love of the IP overall. While the first half of the book makes it an ok read overall, I felt like there was almost nothing here that increased my love of these characters. Maybe if the series had been read by me sooner or contained origins for supporting characters like Ashburn, the Maos, Maros Inara to increase my understanding of them. Unfortuntely, this wasn't the case and, as a result I very much doubt I would return to it as well as making me incredibly skeptical about checking out volume 2.
Fortunately, I've still got a copy of Leviathan Wakes on my prose novel 'to read' list which I can pin my hopes on now.
Oh, and Before I Forget ...
Meanwhile, I really love Emanuele Parascandolo's art, which has some real vibrancy and lightness to it (thanks to the colours of Michele Monte), making me think of the one-shot Parenthood (previously by Ryan K. Lindsay), which was also a driving comic and did have a greater sense of speed/urgency. Also, the story in itself, while reminiscient of a load of prior stories, I still found interesting even if it felt a little bit bare bones. As a result, even if there were cons to reading Speed Republic, I found that there were more than enough pros to outweigh them. I enjoyed the potential of Speed Republic and thought it was bordering a good comic. As a result of this, I certainly will be coming back for issue 2 to see if it has picked up speed.
And that's been my week (or more specifically, weekend given that I read I Walk with Monsters and re-read Batman: White Knight but chose not to write about them last week). I had wanted to try and get some writing done on my personal stories which I've been dreaming up but sadly, the time just wasn't there. That said, I did think of a new idea thanks to my wife telling me her story of her day just the other day. As a result, I've thought up a rough plot that I could cover three or four pages and will try and spend this week writing it out.
But, I do also hope to review something and read some comics from my pull list, so I need to make sure I don't break myself and find Im deleting everything I've written again.
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