Soulfire #2 – Review

By: J.T. Krul (writer), Jason Fabok (artist), John Starr (colorist)

The Story: Aw, shucks, Onyx—can’t we all just try to get along?

The Review: Probably Krul’s most self-defeating weakness is his inability to deliver a story that reaches beyond the expected or cliché.  While the source material for Soulfire seems like it never had much in the way of original thought to begin with, Krul had the opportunity to break that trend in this third volume of the series, and he has squandered it disappointingly.  So far, the title reads like a steady jumble of classic fantasy tropes, a prime example of formulaic writing.

I confess I’ve never read the other volumes of Soulfire, but I can only imagine the war between Sethoru and Rahtumi made the bulk of its previous plots.  So it’s rather frustrating to see Krul opening that can of worms again, especially since the two races only just started their integration.  Had we seen signs of discontent between them, maybe a revisit to their old antagonism would work, but by all appearances, the transition has gone smoothly, to the relief of all.

All of which makes the Sethoru’s decision to follow Onyx at the end an inexplicably unwise choice, especially since Onyx is a deranged, babbling, egomaniacal racist.  With her newfound powers she strikes not only the Rahtumi she hates, but her own people as well, essentially coercing them to depart from the beautiful, peaceful kingdom they’ve only begun to appreciate in favor of a life full of big, snarling, winged leeches.

While Onyx is clearly a one-note villain designed to be disliked (but only in a distant sort of way, as frankly, you don’t really give a hoot what she gets up to), the rest of the title’s cast don’t venture much beyond their types.  Even Grace, one of the most important leads, shows so little personality other than “determined warrior princess” that she’s not much more than a glorified extra in terms of character depth.