By: Jason Aaron (writer), R.M. Guera (art), Giulia Brusco (colors), Steve Wands (letters) & Will Dennis (editor)
The Story: A new story arc begins on our favorite Lakota reservation.
What’s Good: It’s nice to get plunged back into an ongoing Scalped story. For quite a few months, we’ve has done-in-ones and short arcs that were around the periphery of the Scalped universe. They were outstanding stories and we are richer for knowing more about Shunka and Agent Nix, but it is still nice to head back into something that feels a little bigger. It wouldn’t surprise me if this is the beginning of the next ~30 issue big story in Scalped.
There are lots of points for tension introduced in this issue as Aaron kinda arrays his chess pieces on the game board. They are all intriguing and really make me anticipated the boiling point(s) that we’ll see in the next couple years. Probably the biggest development is that Dash Bad Horse seems to be Red Crow’s new right hand man. His addictions are gone and Red Crow values his toughness and brains. Of course, that isn’t going to go over well at all with Shunka who seems to be losing his “chief advisor” role for Red Crow and will now merely be muscle. Shunka seems to be a ticking bomb and the explosion is going to be pretty badass! There are a lot of other neat angles tossed into this issue that hold a lot of promise for the future. A few of them are only touched on, leaving you saying, “What the hell was THAT?” It should be fun!
It is nice to have Guera back on art duties. The guest artists have all been very good, but this is kinda Guera and Aaron’s series, so it’s nice to have all the characters back to they way they “should” look. Guera has a very dark and gritty style that is perfect for this series.
What’s Not So Good: This issue is really all about the promise of things to come. That’s fitting because it is noted as being issue 1 out of 5 and feels like the beginning of something much larger. Still, it is a change of pace from what Scalped has fed us the last 8 months or so like the frenzied done-in-one story last month about Agent Nix, or the touching done-in-one about the old folks or the 2-parter about Shunka. You read this and you do initially feel a little disappointed until you remember how much you LOVED the slow burn of the first ~35 issues of Scalped. It’ll be worth it, but it’ll take some time.
I also thought that some of Guera’s art looked a little sparse. There are a number of interior panels that have no background at all, just a generic flat orange background. And there are some other panels that don’t have quite the attention to appropriate grittiness that is present in the rest of the issue.
Conclusion: The beginning of another slow burn. Aaron introduces a LOT of interesting elements in this issue and we’ll enjoy watching it unfold over the next couple of years.
Grade: B-
-Dean Stell
Grade
Conclusion