The Unwritten: Tommy Taylor and the Ship that Sank Twice – Review

By: Mike Carey (writer/creator), Peter Gross (layouts/creator), Kurt Huggins, Al Davison, Russ Braun, Shawn McManus, Dean Ormston, Gary Erskine & Gross (finishes), Zelda Devon, Davison, Chris Chuckry, Eva de la Cruz & Jeanne McGee (colors)

The Review: While this OGN isn’t all I hoped, it is worthwhile to consider the status of The Unwritten franchise before really diving into any serious criticism.

For the first 49 issues of its Volume 1 run, The Unwritten told a story as complex and nuanced as any comic currently in publication.  In those issues, it dug deeply into the power of stories to shape reality, propaganda, religion, and what happens when humans lose the ability to create.  It was truly wonderful….but it never sold very well.  By the end of its 49-issue run, sales had slipped to ~8,000 issues/month and that usually leads to cancellation of the series.  However, what we got was not a rushed conclusion to The Unwritten.  Instead, Volume 1 run is ending with a (pretty terrible) crossover with the Fables Universe.  The crossover is a cute enough story, but it has absolutely none of the complexity of The Unwritten and has nothing to do with the first 49 issues.  Now we get this OGN (which I’ll discuss in a minute) and a relaunch of Volume 2 sometime this winter.

On one hand, I could complain that *they* aren’t finishing the story that I – and ~8000 other people – was enjoying for the first 49 issues.  On the other hand, I could be grateful that the series didn’t just have a rushed ending – The End.  Someone at Vertigo fought to keep this series going despite low sales and decided to try this as a strategy to bring in some new eyeballs because an audience of 8000 fans isn’t very profitable.

With that out of the way, it’s natural to expect this OGN to be “new reader friendly” and it is.  If you are one of those intrepid 8000 fans and you hoped this OGN would pick right back up with the story of Tom Taylor in Hades, you will be disappointed.

The Unwritten #12 – Review

By: Mike Carey & Peter Gross (script, story & layouts), Kurt Huggins & Zelda Devon (finishes & colors), Todd Klein (letters)

The Story: A Winnie-the-Poo-esque Rabbit uses all kinds of filthy words and we learn of another power that Wilson Taylor has over stories.

What’s Good: This is going to be in the running for my “issues of the year.”  We’re one-third of the way through 2010 and this is the best single issue comic I’ve read so far (in the non-spandex division…. I don’t even try to compare superheroes and other genres). If you were a huge a fan of issue #5 (the Rudyard Kipling issue), be prepared to be amazed again.  This is better. The main stars of the series do not make a single appearance and only Wilson Taylor is even mentioned by name.  It is impossible to say much more about this without getting into spoiler-territory, so if you’d like the book unruined, just skip to my score at the bottom.