Spawn #2

Nov 1997. Cover price £2.00.
52 pages. Full colour contents.
Titan Magazines.

Edited by Marcus Hearn.

Cover p: Todd McFarlane, i: Ken Steacy, coloured by Kiko Taganashi.
r: cropped cover from Spawn (Image Comics) #03 (Aug 1992).

Contents:

 2 Spawn text introduction (uncredited).

 3 Indicia

 4 Spawn Questions, part three, w:/a: Todd McFarlane, lettering by Tom Orzechowski, colouring by Steve Oliff, Reuben Rude & Olyoptics.

r: Spawn (Image Comics) #03 (Aug 1992).

26 The Official Tie-In to Spawn's Big Screen Deal with the Devil! in-house advertisement for Spawn: The Making of the Movie and graphic novels.

27 Spawn Questions, part four, w:/a: Todd McFarlane, lettering by Tom Orzechowski, colouring by Steve Oliff (as Olyoptics).

r: Spawn (Image Comics) #04 (Sep 1992).

49 Visually Effected Scott Leberecht interview by Brent Ashe.

51 Next feature.

52 Forbidden Planet advertisement.

An effective cover, which (wisely) promotes a sense of darkness through careful editing, though the distressed lettering atop the cover - continued in the introductory pages' headlines - is somewhat distracting. Effective enough, despite appearing rather dated (even at the time), with carefully chosen images taen from the strip to provide visual interest.

Spawn's memory comes back gradually, remembering his wife, Wanda, and he determines to discover what has occurred during his five-year absence. Transforming himself into a less attention-grabbing form, he visits her, learning that she is married with a child. Violator introduces himself to Spawn, who is still tormented after visiting his widow, and makes his true form known.

There is a lot of information about the characters presented, yet this somehow feels as if it is light on story. The manner in which things are presented to the reader, through internal monologue and, in the case of the devil, monologuing to thin air, feels more appropriate for some other medium. The visual storytelling isn't bad, but too many panels are depicted as if for an action-adventure story than brooding horror, giving the strip an odd juxtaposition which doesn't appear to be mellowing out. Far too stylised to feel as if we are looking in on events, the artificiality of the world surrounding Spawn is incessantly highlighted.

This is a story I am trying my hardest to enjoy, but finding the superhero conventions a barrier to fully appreciating.

For the past week or so, Lt. Colonel Al Simmons has been trying to cope with his so-called reality.

That reality includes him being brought back from the dead; selling his soul; being given what seem to be unlimited powers; and getting shot five years into his future, as a white man... When he is black.

Fate has not been kind to Mr. Simmons. With the advent of his death becoming a distant memory, his life continued forward. There's the irony.

His whole reason for returning from the grave was the unrelenting love he had for his wife. Earlier in the day he saw her again. The devil had kept his end of the bargain.

But while seeing his wife, he also learned that she was happily remarried. Worse than that... The one thing she had always wanted, the one thing Al could never give her, had been delivered.

A child.

That meant that Simmons had been the problem. Now he feels like less of a man.

No wife.

No identity.

No pride.

His heart had been torn apart both emotionally...

...and physically.

That's a lot of exposition, huh? Well, that's only from the first page of the next chapter. Admittedly, it is an effective summation of what has gone before, and accompanied by a rather striking illustration of his beating heart being held aloft by the Vindicator, but it is one of the weaknesses of these early issues. The tendency towards explaining and elaborating the narrative rather than depicting events, so the reader can accompany Al on his journey through the story, places events at a remove.

The other problem is how the few bolded words come across when being read - I have been struck by how it slips into the 'voice' of Bobcat Goldthwait when I'm not attempting to 'hear' Simmons' personality in the words. It's impossible for me to read Spawn without thinking of him now. All I need now is a story where Spawn is disguised as a police officer...

Restoring his heart to its rightful location, and without overtly referencing Monty Python, Spawn and Violator do battle. Violator tells Spawn - at considerable length - what is going on, and the status quo is restored - with severed limbs being replaced magically. By reinforcing links to the other Image titles, with Savage Dragon appearing on television screens, and discussion made of Youngblood, the horror nature is once again downplayed in order to appease superhero sensibilities. It isn't an effective sequence.

The Behind-the-Scenes interview, focusing on the Spawn movie's special effects, with Scott Lebrecht, art director for ILM, isn't exactly a ringing endorsement for the film. Focusing on superficial details so early in the title's life - with Spawn's cape getting special attention - should have been adequate warning. That the plot and acting came second place to the appearance of the effects was evident in hindsight, but hearing such lavish praise being heaped upon the film here is particularly worrisome.

You can't tell from an interview how such effects would appear, which is a slight drawback to the piece, and of the three photographs chosen to accompany it, two are incomprehensible without having seen the film. Why is there the upper half of a character floating amidst lightning, and what is that red smudge to the lower left? Questions, it must be said, which I don't care enough about to go checking.

Not a great promotion for the adaptation, but a fine comic.

Fantastic value for money, but without a sense of urgency which the story seems like it should have. Had Al Simmons' story been handled in a manner closer to Hellraiser, and with more of Se7en in the police procedural elements, it might have been a top tier strip. As it stands... Not really.

#01

Spawn

#03