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Ludtke, Jason – Colossal: Before Curious Machines
Colossal: Before Curious Machines
Regular readers of the website may remember this comic, as I praised the pants off of it for the last issue that I’d read. It also seems like I may have missed an issue or two, or maybe it’s just the fact that I haven’t read the last issue for a couple of years and my memory is a garbage pile. One or the other! Anyway, the basic gist is that a giant robot wakes up in a desolate world with very little idea of what it is or what’s going on. In this issue the robot and his bird friend are looking for clues and run across a group of deer (herd?). There’s a fantastic philosophical discussion on whether or not the robot is alive or has consciousness, then they tell the robot where it should next go to get more clues. We also get to see a regular dream of this bird (which shows some great hints about its place in the universe) and we see more and more clues about what is left of this world. For example, at this point they’re in what used to be Milwaukee. No humans are to be seen, but the bird has seen a few in its past, and we also see the first (?) genuinely hostile act against the robot, but I shouldn’t get into what that was all about. My only complaint is that there were a few typos (all of the dialogue is typed), which is the sort of thing that you really should work past after a couple of issues. Nothing that broke the story, and possibly nothing that nobody else noticed, but the typos, they do stick in my craw. I remain fascinated in this story and very much wonder where it’s all heading, which is all that you can ask out of an ongoing book like this.
Ludtke, Jason – Colossal #3
Colossal #3
Hey look, a few questions were answered this time around! And lots more were asked, and even more questions were left to be answered in later issues. Of course, none of this makes any sense if you haven’t read earlier issues of this series, but that’s on you. Things start off with a brief musical interlude, sheet music and all, showing the trajectory of a bullet as it enters that truck with all the bullet holes from the last issue. As I can’t read music I’m very curious to hear what it sounds like, but I’ll have to check that later. From there we get the birds chatting with the giant robot as the robot tries to explain why he knows about the truck without having what they would think of as a memory of it. He had me convinced, but one of the birds freaks out right away, thinking that the robot is looking to kill them. Which, hey, not the craziest idea in the world, as they still have very little idea of what went on and what role the robot played in it. The other bird (the one on the cover) decides to stick it out, and the rest of the issue is spent introducing the robot to the concept of night, exploring a bag found at the scene, and going off following after what’s in the bag. I loved the playback of the events coming purely from the robot’s perspective, and Jason did a fantastic job of showing how genuinely odd that perspective would be. Things are looking to get interesting in the next issue too, if the road sign is any indication (and no, I’m not going to spoil what it says). This has been interesting as hell so far, and has the makings of being a great series, so check it out why don’t you? $5
Ludtke, Jason – Colossal: Vulpes Vulpes
Colossal: Vulpes Vulpes
I was all set for a righteous rant about this comic, but it turns out that it’s not #3 in the series after all and is instead just another part of the series. Supplemental material. Which is fine, but isn’t there a law that says that you can’t do such things until you have at least five issues of a series out? There isn’t? Well, there should be. Still, this is Jason’s vision, he gets to let things unfold at exactly the speed he prefers. So what’s this comic about? Well, it depicts the day that the big guy from the past two issues crashes to the ground. Or does it? We’re left to assume that it does, and it seems like a pretty safe bet. Anyway, we also get some technical chatter, with a few intriguing code words thrown in. The bulk of the comic is the reaction of the red foxes in the area (hence the title), but we also see very little of that. Honestly, this is a tough comic to judge by itself. As part of the series, at this exact moment in time, it’s a disappointment. If another issue comes out pretty soon, and if it ties in with this (as it surely will down the road, or what’s the point of releasing the issue at all?), then this one will end up looking better. And this will make some fine bonus material in an eventual graphic novel. But you have to keep interest up to GET TO a collected edition, and while this doesn’t kill the momentum of the first two issues, it does slow it down a bit. $2.50
Ludtke, Jason – Colossal #2: Illumine
Colossal #2: Illumine
Oh, so THAT’S what that title of “Colossal” meant. It was difficult to get a handle on the scale of the creature/robot in the first issue, as it was in a forest and it only interacted with one tiny bird. This time around our hero is on the move and we see that he towers over at least some trees and is clearly much larger than a truck. I’m loving the pacing of these issues, as Jason lets us feel every heavy stomp of the robot’s feet. He also gave us plenty of room to get a sense of the panic that started to creep into the robot when his guide disappeared for a few pages, but I’m getting ahead of myself. This issue is basically the journey to another bird and the robot’s steps along the way. He meets a fox (and gets a much better sense of the way of the world after that conversation), meets the “wise” bird and takes steps to follow its advice. The comic ends with a damned intriguing panel that doesn’t seem to be related to much that came before, but I can say no more about that. I’m getting just the barest hint of a True Swamp vibe from this series. Talking animals will do that to me, granted, but there’s also the fact that these talking animals are laying out some serious truths about the natural order of things. And yes, being compared to probably the best series from Jon Lewis is meant as high praise. Oh, and I just saw on Jason’s website that he calls the robot “IT.” Make of that what you will, but at this point I’m happy to be firmly along for the ride. $4
Ludtke, Jason – Colossal #1: Feathers and Composite Armour
Colossal #1: Feather and Composite Armour
I’ll say one thing for Jason: the man knows how to set a scene. This is the first of three comics in this series, so naturally setting the scene is damned important. He can’t give too much away or risk ruining future surprises and he can’t give too little away or he’ll risk alienating those short attention span folks who can’t live without their phone being within reach at all times. Go on, admit it, you were checking a text during that last sentence. Anyway, this comic opens up with a wide shot of a field, and from there we slowly move into a forest. We see sharp angles, the hint of something huge, and finally a hand on the ground. A display area on the hand opens up, we get a clear indication of what’s happening (I don’t want to spell the whole thing out for you), and finally the title character is revealed, roughly halfway through the comic. The rest of the comic is a conversation between our hero (as far as I know; it may turn out to be the destroyer of all humanity before the series is done) and a bird that happens across it, as they try to determine just what sort of creature it is. It has amnesia, you see, which can be a lazy trope to explain that part of the story… unless it’s done well. And this thing is clearly at least part robot, so amnesia could just be a programming thing. I’m intrigued, which is all that’s required out of the first issue of a longer series. The panel structure was a bit clunky at times, as some bits of foliage stopped when the panel stopped and others kept going, making their conversation occasionally difficult to follow, but that’s a minor quibble. $2.50
