Katana #3 – Review

By: Ann Nocenti (story), Cliff Richards (pencils), Rebeca Buchman, Juan Castro, Le Beau Underwood, Phyllis Novin (inks), Pete Pantazis (colors)

The Story: The Dagger Clan try to prove that the size of one’s sword really doesn’t matter.

The Review: I always find it a little risky when a creator mentions how he was inspired by this-or-that or so-and-so in his latest project.  Most of the time, he’s referring to some seminal work of the past, which is now held up as a standard for all works to follow.  Not that this is his intention, but why invite that comparison?  It just raises fans’ expectations and skeptics’ eyebrows that much higher, and a story tends to suffer in the process.

In nearly every interview I’ve read of Nocenti talking about Katana, she’s referred to Seven Samurai as a source of inspiration.  I find this rather amusing because not only does the substance of this series bear no resemblance to that legendary film (except, perhaps, for Katana being a samurai—sort of), but nothing in the tone nor the structure of Katana evokes the spirit that made Seven Samurai special.  This title already suffers from its own shortcomings; it can only look even worse when beheld next to a masterpiece.