Customer Reviews

Spear of Destiny (The Darkness, Volume 3) (v. 3)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

First of all, i'd like to point out that the actual title of this book is not The Darkness Vol. 3, but The Darkness: Spear of Destiny. I was not a fan of The Darkness series. I picked up the first two issues and then stopped. However, what drew me to pick this book up, was that it contains the first appearance of the Magdalena, who got her own mini series following her appearance in the Darkness issues. The mini series was drawn by Joe Benitez, who also drew the Darkness issues collected within this book. In my opinion, his work in this trade paperback is better than art in the Magdalena mini. I was surprised by how good this book is. A very entertaining story by Malachy Coney, and excellent art by Benitez. If you're a fan of dark superhero comics like Batman or Spawn, gothic horror, or other Top Cow comics female characters like the Witchblade...i guarantee you'll enjoy this book.

I actually read this story arc in the Darkness: Original Sin trade paperback. This book collects issues # 15 - 17 of the original Darkness comic series. The book is no longer being written by Garth Ennis and that is a bit of a drawback as Malachey Coney doesn't handle dialogue as well but this was still a good story. We start as an amibitious Cardinal Innocent is sending out the Magdalena, another of those ancient powers/warriors in the Top Cow universe. She's kind of a holy warrior with the body of a super model (naturally). He arms her with the ancient Spear of Destiny, the spear which pierced Jesus on the cross which an earlier Magdalena had recovered from Hitler himself. She is sent out after Jackie Estacado, AKA the Darkness to kill what she has been programmed to believe is one of the ultimate tools of evil.

Unfortunately, the Magdelena was not prepared properly by taking part in the rituals that she needed to fully use her powers effectively. As a result, she is beaten badly by Jackie. Cardinal Innocent manages to find a fall guy in the form of another priest who takes responsiblity before a group of church inquisitors of sending the Magdelena out. We don't see what happens to the priest, but evidently it's not very pleasant.

The art is consistently excellent throughout the story and The Darkness really is an art-driven book as evidenced by two page spreads that you turn sideways ala a Playboy centerfold to view and read. Not surprisingly the subject of these two page spreads are typically scantily clad women. While Coney is no Garth Ennis, "Spear of Destiny" was a strong story with gorgeous art and enough plot to make it interesting.