Carbon Grey #3 – Advanced Review

By: Houng Nguyen, Khari Evans, Paul Gardner, Mike Kennedy (story), Paul Gardner (script and lettering), Khari Evans, Kinsun Loh, Hoang Nguyen (art)

The Story: Life is pretty crappy all around for the four special sisters who are the elite enforcers of a Reich-like empire. The Kaiser is killed on their watch, enemies encircle, and the four girls are hunted, even those who had no involvement.

The Review: Welcome to the third installment of this Prussian steampunk masterwork. In it, you’ll find absolutely stunning art and a complex, multi-layered political espionage plot filled with ninja-styled action in a Kaiser Wilhelm setting. The images are truly arresting, from the leaning, half-destroyed iron and steel tower, steel-gray against a slate sky, to blazing gunfights, plane crashes, moody colored flashbacks, secret missions and scarred hunters. Really, there is no way for me to effectively describe this art other than to say it is fabulous. The emotiveness in the expressions are some of the best I’ve seen in two years of reviewing comics, well on par with Cascioli’s stuff, but here shown with a simultaneously shinier and grittier sensibility.

Split evenly between writing and drawing, Carbon Grey takes advantage of the flexibility of the laws of physics in the comics medium. This leads to some eye-popping visuals, but that are wholly dramatic in their impact and hovering between ironic and surreal in their tone. I’m talking about riding a flaming aircraft like a weaponized surfboard, wielding a sword that cuts like a lightsaber, and the kind of samurai-like self-possession it takes to do both at the same time.

Carbon Grey #1 – Review

By: Hoang Nguyen, Khari Evans, Paul Gardner & Mike Kennedy (story), Gardner (script & letters), Evans, Kinsun Loh & Nguyen (art)

The Story: It’s a steampunk-ish tale involving prophecy and ladies who kick butt.

What’s Good: I honestly didn’t enjoy a whole lot about this comic book.  But if I had to pick out a high point, it is the art.  Now, I’m going to throw some rocks at the art down below, but there is no denying that this comic has some very nice individual panels with very detailed and soft lines combined with painted looking colors.  Even if this style isn’t a personal favorite of mine this issue definitely has its moments.