Filed under: Exquisite Reviews | Tags: Alasdair Stuart, antony johnston, Christopher Mitten, Dalone, Image, John Rauch, Rascal, Thomas Mauer, Umbral;
Written by Antony Johnson
Art by Christopher Mitten
Colours by John Rauch
Letters by Thomas Mauer
Published by Image
Issues 1 and 2 available now!
£2.20 each
Rascal is a thief. She’s small, agile, cheerfully ruthless and in massively over her head. Rascal’s best friend is Prince Arthir, and, together the pair explore the palace. Rascal, of course, has an ulterior motive but events soon overtake her. The eclipse, always a cause for ceremony, is coming but this time, something is coming with it. The Umbral are rising, the Umbral are already here and the Umbral want what Rascal has.
I’m at the point now where I’m all set to give up my ‘I don’t really like fantasy’ claims and just admit that a bunch of my favourite stories occupy that genre. Novels like The Copper Promise by Jennifer Williams and Banished by Liz De Jager are amongst the best books on the way in 2014 and Umbral is already one of the best comics on the market. It’s also absolutely high fantasy, with thieves, kings, conspiracies and absolutely none of the comforting story beats you’d expect from those tropes. This is a book that’s red in tooth and claw from the get go and utterly gripping from the very first page.
Johnston’s script balances big ideas with moments of real, character-driven humour and horror. Rascal is immense fun and the double act that develops in issue 2 with Dalone, a mysterious ‘hobo’ gives Johnston plenty of chance to stretch his comedy muscles. That grounds the book in a way a lot of stereotypical high fantasy never manages. It’s brought into land by the constant threat, and occasional horror, that stalks Rascal and the book alike. People die quickly and very, very badly here and no one is safe. That, coupled with the glorious, abstract nightmare of the Umbral makes for a read packed with more tension than a lot of the other books out there. Even better, Johnston manages to fold some distinctive world building in without it ever seeming expository.
Mitten’s work is nothing less than stunning throughout. The characters are all expressive, realistic and distinctive and the environments are a gorgeous combination of medieval, Renassiance and early industrial. It’s the Umbral that will stay with you though, nightmarish abstractions of black shapes and endless teeth. In turn, Rauch’s colours bathe the whole book in deep, rich twilight tones that further emphasize just how bad things are getting. Finally, Mauer’s lettering captures each speech pattern with ease and, in issue 2, gives us a fascinating look at what magic reads, and sounds, like in this world.
Two issues in, Umbral is yet another of Image’s year of remarkable new titles. It’s bloody and funny, often at the same time and feels like the confident opening chapters of an epic. Get comfortable, because this is one story you’re going to want to follow all the way to the end.
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