MATT LOWDER Looks At REAVER Volume One

Guest review by Run The Comics 5K's MATT LOWDER . . . . .

REAVER, VOLUME 1 (Image Comics, 2020) Contains Issues #1-6

     This came out in March 2020, and we all remember March, I'm sure. Everything was imploding and our lives, release schedules, and careers were being impacted. No surprise I missed this completely.

Such a shame, too. REAVER snaps, crackles, and pops. The writing and the personalities achieved in this rag-tag anti-hero squad is fantastically entertaining. Art is the secondary draw. Think of the Blues Brothers getting together, but it's all in Westeros, and written by Brandon Sanderson or Scott Lynch who did MISTBORN and  LIES OF LOCKE LAMORA respectively (two of the best best modern fantasy novels published). Oh, and, Jake and Elwood have axes instead of mics and harmonicas. 

This is a quest. This arc is an escort mission and infiltration side-quest, a la Dragon Age: Inquisition. We follow a team of people who don't want to work with one another (a la Suicide Squad). They are poisoned and then freed from their bondage in exchange for a task. Each day on their quest, they'll be given a temporary serum so the poison doesn't kill them, so long as they continue their goal of murder, thievery, sorcery, and the political pivoting of kingdoms at war.

      It's a very solid offering, despite a very "exposition heavy" first issue with a lot of world and plot building. It's not how I would have started the series. But after we meet the cast, all very unique in voice and personality, I was hooked.

      If you dig medieval grim fantasy, plot twists, anti-heroes, violence, how empires function, caste system examinations, and D&D archetypes like the berserker, the rogue, the wildling, this is engaging, even with it's small flaws:  an overly mystic and bloody Issue #6, the surprising loss of a character, and some pale coloring. I liked this more than MONSTRESS and THE REALM and as much as ONCE AND FUTURE and THE LAST GOD. Top-notch dialogue and world-building almost gets this a 4.5 rating. FOUR out of a possible FIVE STARS.