Kyle Katarn
01-18-2005, 01:13 PM
Moonstone Books (moonstonebooks.com) has started making a Phantom comic, and it's really good. The short version of this post is 'go buy it!' The long winded geek version follows:
Straight off the bat in 'Stones of Blood' we see that this isn't quite your daddy's Phantom. Dispensing with the whole 'never use your guns on people' motif the comic strip Phantom had, Mr. Walker starts off with a bang in brutally taking out some rogue miners using Bangallan natives as slaves. He snaps the arm of one like a twig, then blows a hole in the hand of another who draws a gun on him. We soon see that my initial reaction was right AND wrong. This is the same Kit Walker from the strip set in the 30's, complete with wife Diana and children Kit and Heloise. But the time is now, the new millenium, post 9/11 and all. Kit seems to have traces of Billy Zane's portrayal as him, having fun with his role. "Tarzan's a fictional character....I'M a jungle legend! There's a difference!"
But there are still nice touches that show the writers know their source. From the cool (if improbable) feat of Kit shooting the guns out of a whole gang of thugs, to the fact that we NEVER see his eyes....done in the strip through his ever-present sunglasses, and in the book with those as well as shadow.
The second arc, 'Curse of the Phantom' showcases more of where the first Phantom got his 'act,' and demonstrates nicely how Diana is, as one writer put it, 'the ORIGINAL tough chippe!' Confronted by Kua, the demon god who has haunted the Phantom for 4 centuries, she takes the initiative in attacking him first: "You know what they say...behind every great man...is a woman YOU DO NOT WANT TO PISS OFF!" This story also takes a look back at past Phantoms and thier run-ins with people that will soon become famous...from the 10th Phantom's escort of Catherine the Great through Germany, to another Phantom enlisting the aid of NYPD Commissioner Teddy Roosevelt in 1896!
Some minor gripes though, as nothings perfect. In the second arc, Christopher Walker was mentioned as the first Phantom, when he was actually the slain father of the first Phantom. And in the end of the first arc they say that the 'conservitive' members of the UN refused to sanction nations that harbored terrorists. To be more accurate, I think they should have said it was the 'liberals' that didn't want to 'abandon' those nations. Us conservatives would only vote down sanctions so we could go straight to the cruise missiles! :twisted: :hehe:
Ok, that concludes the political talk. There are also 3 one-shots out there (and in one trade) that have some different Phantom stores. 'The Singh Web' features probably the 1930-s era Phantom of the comic strip in an early adventure...no wife, no kids, even a different horse. The Treasures of Bangalla and The Ghost Killer are more modern tales. TTOB was all right, but TGK was a great tale, where a beautiful and deadly Spanish assasin sets out to disprove that the Phantom is immortal. Obviously she fails, but I don't think we've seen the last of her....!
Well, as the monks say at the end of TSW...Long live THE PHANTOM!!!!
Straight off the bat in 'Stones of Blood' we see that this isn't quite your daddy's Phantom. Dispensing with the whole 'never use your guns on people' motif the comic strip Phantom had, Mr. Walker starts off with a bang in brutally taking out some rogue miners using Bangallan natives as slaves. He snaps the arm of one like a twig, then blows a hole in the hand of another who draws a gun on him. We soon see that my initial reaction was right AND wrong. This is the same Kit Walker from the strip set in the 30's, complete with wife Diana and children Kit and Heloise. But the time is now, the new millenium, post 9/11 and all. Kit seems to have traces of Billy Zane's portrayal as him, having fun with his role. "Tarzan's a fictional character....I'M a jungle legend! There's a difference!"
But there are still nice touches that show the writers know their source. From the cool (if improbable) feat of Kit shooting the guns out of a whole gang of thugs, to the fact that we NEVER see his eyes....done in the strip through his ever-present sunglasses, and in the book with those as well as shadow.
The second arc, 'Curse of the Phantom' showcases more of where the first Phantom got his 'act,' and demonstrates nicely how Diana is, as one writer put it, 'the ORIGINAL tough chippe!' Confronted by Kua, the demon god who has haunted the Phantom for 4 centuries, she takes the initiative in attacking him first: "You know what they say...behind every great man...is a woman YOU DO NOT WANT TO PISS OFF!" This story also takes a look back at past Phantoms and thier run-ins with people that will soon become famous...from the 10th Phantom's escort of Catherine the Great through Germany, to another Phantom enlisting the aid of NYPD Commissioner Teddy Roosevelt in 1896!
Some minor gripes though, as nothings perfect. In the second arc, Christopher Walker was mentioned as the first Phantom, when he was actually the slain father of the first Phantom. And in the end of the first arc they say that the 'conservitive' members of the UN refused to sanction nations that harbored terrorists. To be more accurate, I think they should have said it was the 'liberals' that didn't want to 'abandon' those nations. Us conservatives would only vote down sanctions so we could go straight to the cruise missiles! :twisted: :hehe:
Ok, that concludes the political talk. There are also 3 one-shots out there (and in one trade) that have some different Phantom stores. 'The Singh Web' features probably the 1930-s era Phantom of the comic strip in an early adventure...no wife, no kids, even a different horse. The Treasures of Bangalla and The Ghost Killer are more modern tales. TTOB was all right, but TGK was a great tale, where a beautiful and deadly Spanish assasin sets out to disprove that the Phantom is immortal. Obviously she fails, but I don't think we've seen the last of her....!
Well, as the monks say at the end of TSW...Long live THE PHANTOM!!!!