Flash Gordon #3 Review

The title of this month's story in Flash Gordon #3 is Merciless, and it is extremely fitting.

This issue starts off with a background on Ming and how he came to be. You can't even describe his coming into existence as birth - he was completely grown in a machine, along with many others, in order to increase the chances of a suitable heir. As a parent, as I was reading this, I reflected on how beautiful having and raising a child is - and how it's nothing like what brought Ming into the world. 

Jeremy Adams is definitely going with a slow burn here, and that's just fine. Flash Gordon is a great book to do a big, sprawling epic and this is definitely building up to that. So far we've seen the destruction of Mongo, Flash's escape from his cell on Death Planet, and then the entire second issue is more of his escape, and he meets up with Ming! We see at the end of last issue that Ming is likely throwing Flash under the bus, and I won't spoil what happens this issue but… looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, must be a duck - right? Right??

Will Conrad has a very distinct style, and I think it has something to do with his inks. It seems like he uses his inks to create most of the shadows in his art, which doesn't leave a lot of room for colorist Lee Loughridge to work. In the pages below, you can see how in some instances, the inks are doing all the shading work in the art, but in others Conrad does some light hatching which allows Loughridge to do more with his colors in that spot. I know that a lot of artists ink in this way, and to me it's a style that you find more often in the bronze age than the modern age. I think there are parts of the book where it works and parts where it doesn't. Overall, Conrad and Loughridge do a nice job in this issue - with Conrad really excelling in the action and Loughridge keeping a nice consistent color pallete throughout. 

The lettering from Esposito with the cyclops/monster dialogue is great - it's shakier, bolder and slightly larger (but not distractingly so) which gives the feel of a growling voice. Unfortunately, none of this lettering is present in the preview pages that I am able to share with you. The rest of Esposito's lettering is what we've come to expect from him: great classic sound effects, nice page design, and creative tweaks.

I think that Jeremy Adams is utilizing the serialized format to the fullest extent. There's no way that this can be considered “writing for the trade” because we're definitely not getting a nice clean ending after this arc, but also these issues aren't standalone either. We’ve had slow but steady progress through the story, and Adams hasn't been leaving a ton of plot line that you need to carry over from the prior issue, which is what makes it such a well executed comic. If I say, “What happened last month in Flash Gordon?” it can be answered simply - “Oh Flash is still on Planet Death and is reluctantly teaming up with Ming to escape, but has just been tossed in a gladiator fight.” Simple, exciting, to the point. 

Flash Gordon #3 hits stands today, Wednesday October 16th from Mad Cave Studios and I'm really enjoying it so far - it definitely has a classic comic feel to it!