The Harbinger #8 Review: The Identity You Choose

 

The Harbinger #8 Pre-Order Cover by Caspar Wijngaard

The Harbinger #8 opens with a montage of images. It can be hard to parse them out. But basically, they signal that all our Psiot City Harbingers have their hands full.

In writer Joshua Dysart's Harbinger series, Peter reached into Kris Hathaway's mind, and made her love him. Her love gave him a moment of completeness and peace in his short, tormented life. But as that wasn't her authentic choice--to become his lover--it didn't last.

We must choose our roles in lives. Our identities.

Now, as the Harbinger and the Renegade face off one final time, each must test their own--their recently discovered--identities. Is that who they truly are?

 

As the first page montage suggests, there's more than the Harbinger's identity at stake in The Harbinger #8. Peter activated Cici's latent abilities in the previous issue. Ago has all-too-often used his power--as a living loudspeaker--to impose his views on others. Now each must test their own identities too.

Letterer Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou helps this process along with his careful shaping, staging, and coloring of dialogue balloons. Colorist Rico Renzi reminds us of how dramatically a colorist can elevate comic art. If penciler and inker Robbi Rodriguez couldn't show us everything he was capable of in the previous issues of this second story arc, he's certainly in top form for this final installment.

Writers Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly leaven big sweeping events with welcome injections of humor. 

While bringing back characters Peter Stanchek and Faith Herbert, The Harbinger series ushered in plenty of new ones. Some of these have incredible powers.

Sadly, some we never really got to know all that well. Perhaps characters like the Renegade's friend Thrall, and the members of the Warning, will return in future series.

Personally, I'm wondering if Faith and Blam will return for their own series. They seem to have formed an odd hero/villain relationship.

Most people love Faith for her soft, hug-able side. In The Harbinger, Faith demonstrates she can also be the badass superhero.

Ultimately, The Harbinger #8 leaves us loving all our heroes a little more. While we wait for future series involving Valiant's psiot community, it suggests what their individual futures might hold. 

 

 

The satisfying end to this series leaves us wondering if psiots will gain more acceptance from mainstream society. As for now...

Farewell Ago, Baxter, and Cici, and Faith. Farewell, Peter Stanchek.

 

Farewell, The Harbinger.

Come back soon.

Dragon Dave

The Harbinger #8 Covers

 

The Harbinger #8 Cover A by ROBBI RODRIGUEZ

Interior artist Robbi Rodriguez may have displeased some fans with his unconventional portrayal of Peter Stanchek's world in The Harbinger. But whatever you think of his Manga-style penciling and inking, you have to admire his productivity. Not only has Robbi drawn all eight issues for this uninterrupted monthly run, but he has also contributed a cover for every installment of the series. 

I wonder: can any other recent artist make a similar claim?

Additionally, Robbi's covers always portray events that actually occur in the issue. In his final one for The Harbinger, he portrays Peter's final fight with his ultimate nemesis the Renegade. In many ways, this has been the theme of this series, that the biggest enemy we will ever face is...

Ourselves.

The Harbinger #8 Cover B by ZU ORZU

Zu Orzu has created some impressive covers for Valiant, including his fan-voted "Best Of Year" X-O Manowar cover for Exchange Collectibles. For this final issue of The Harbinger, Zu contributes a beautiful portrait of Faith Herbert. This seems perfectly fitting, as she's been the big guest-star of the second story arc.

Additionally, she's probably the most famous Harbinger of them all. Her name has graced the title of more series than any other character. Plus, she's had two Young Adult novels written about her. Everyone loves Faith. (Even George Michael).

Can a Faith Herbert movie be in the cards?

The Harbinger #8 Pre-order Cover by CASPAR WIJNGAARD

Caspar Wijngaard helped launch Valiant's recent Ninjak #1 with his old-school Cover B. Now he helps round off The Harbinger with a Pre-Order Cover featuring Peter and his crew. They're all there--Faith, Baxter, Ago, and Cici. These are the Harbingers who have supported Peter personally, while also protecting the residents of Psiot City. They look good together, don't they?

The splash of purple in the background reminds me of the way Cici painted the Harbinger logo on Peter's new jacket. Another nice touch is that Peter and Cici both have glowing white eyes to suggest that they're calling on their psiot powers. Of the group, Peter is the longest-activated psiot, while Cici is just discovering what she can do. But it's a part of who they are now, like it or not.

I suppose that's the theme of this series, isn't it? That we should really, actually like ourselves. What a thought!

Dragon Dave

Ninjak #3 Spotlight: Coloring

 

Ninjak #3 Pre-Order Cover by Zu Orzu

In Ninjak #3, artist Javier Pulido plays with lighting to achieve some interesting effects. As Ninjak hurtles down from the airplane, Javier shows Ninjak and the assault squad in silhouette. This suggests that the characters are between us and the sun. 

It's so bright that we can't see their features, or the other colors they're wearing.

As Ninjak swings into action, we get closer to Neville's would-be attackers. Now we're close enough that the sun isn't shining in our eyes. We can make out the characters' features, their skin color, and any other colors they wear.

The muddy yellow is the background: the distant fields and fells, or hills. Interestingly, the ground immediately before us is black.

After knocking the rifle from the soldier's hands, it continues to fly upward. Ninjak swings back up on the rope to grasp it. Higher up, Ninjak and the rifle are between us and the sun again. Thus, we see the sky above the muddy yellow fells in this shot.

As Ninjak adjusts his swinging into a circle, we look down from overhead. The ground immediately below is closer to us than the distant fells, and therefore darker. 

Needless to say, Javier is indulging in artistic license here, and choosing his colors from the color wheel to evoke what he feels is a pleasing combination. Although I've never traveled there, I assume that if he were coloring in photorealistic mode, this Scottish island in the Outer Hebrides would be much more green. 

If he was adopting that approach, he couldn't color the ground-level scene of the attackers getting shot in red, which symbolizes not only their deaths, but the assault team's shock.

In my review, I noted that Myna's hair was a light brown in the next panel. This seemed odd at the time, as I've always seen her as having black hair before. Perhaps it's not truly black, but just dark brown.

Obviously, the sun is high above the plane. With the light shining down, the camera view is from below, looking up. From this angle, Myna's hair looks brown, but the cabin ceiling looks black.

 

Next we're level with Myna. From this angle, we see her hair as dark as it normally appears, and the cabin ceiling is muddy yellow.

Of course, the two panels also contrast two emotional states. In the first, Myna is frightened. She's scared that Colin has been injured or killed. In the second, he's back on board: he's safe!

Also, she won't have to cap off her first time flying an airplane by having to land it on her own.

Inside Neville's castle, we see Ninjak and Myna contrasted against Earthtones. This helps the imposing castle feel homey and inviting.

Javier treats us to a closeup look at the stag mounted on the wall. Interestingly, both Colin and Myna appear to pass it by, without noticing the eye turn light up. Does Ninjak not see the light streaming from it?

The way the eye sends out spiky rays reminds me of Ninjak's throwing stars. The way it glows with blue light, versus white, differentiates the stag from a psiot drawing on his or her power.

Lastly, in this underground scene, we see this trio gazing upon a collection of ninja weapons. The lighting level is low, leaving the characters mostly in darkness. The overhead lighting tends toward the red spectrum., coloring only the top of Ninjak and Myna's heads, and a little of their shoulders and arms.

You can guess who the weapon collection belongs to by the way Javier colors it.

 

In Ninjak #3, artist Javier Pulido uses lighting and colors to bring us into Colin and Myna's world. In doing so, he helps us feel a little of what they experience in their mission to the Outer Hebrides, and beyond.

Dragon Dave

Ninjak #3: All The Covers & Why You Need Them

Ninjak #3 Cover A by Fernando Dagnino

 

Although the action in Ninjak #3 kicks off in Scotland, Ninjak and Myna will travel to a scientific research facility in Norway by the issue's end. The glass dome atop the facility has been damaged by whatever destroyed the facility. Does the glass dome suggest that this building once served as observatory?

In Fernando Dagnino's painting, we glimpse these mountains in the background as he enters the facility. I'm left wondering if the chains and gears I see once raised, lowered, and turned a large telescope. Or perhaps they merely power an elevator that services this multistory facility.
 

Ninjak #3 Cover B by Alitha Martinez

 

While Fernando Dagnino's cover pays homage to the thematic coloring style interior artist Javier Pulido employs on each page, Alitha Martinez's painting portrays Ninjak in a more traditional manner. While Fernando showed him leaping into the damaged facility, Alitha shows him taking a more circumspect approach. In her artwork, Ninjak's caution seems warranted, despite the research complex's deserted appearance. 

The off-kilter camera position reminds me of all the snow that has invaded the complex. I feel chilled by the wind that whips through this remote, mountaintop building.

 

Ninjak #3 Pre-Order Cover by Zu Orzu

 

At first, Zu Orzu's artwork for Ninjak #3 seems more thematic or conceptual than representative of the issue. Then I remember what Ninjak and Myna discover at the damaged scientific facility, and how terribly wrong the researchers' experiments went. 

So I study Orzu's artwork again. The more I look at it, the more I think, "Wow! What a totally appropriate cover for this issue!"

Now, if only my mind wouldn't insist on pasting actor Ryan Reynold's face behind that mask. 

Congratulations to Fernando Dagnino, Alitha Martinez, and Zu Orzu on beautifully capturing Ninjak's adventure in Norway in their cover art for Ninjak #3.

Dragon Dave