Xavier Dorison

A rich widow whose son ran away to marry a Native freedom fighter desires her son's body back for burial, as well as his wife (dead) and his halfbreed son (to be brainwashed and adopted). And somehow, Jonas Crow is the funeral agent stuck with the task.

In its sixth volume (or second half of the third story, since each two volumes seem to make up a single tale), the western comic "Undertaker" continues to be excellent reluctant hero storytelling about the travelling funeral agent with a dark show more past and more compassion for his fellow man than he lets on. In this story, picking up where volume 5 left off, a close friend from his youth has gotten him mixed up in the above-described awfulness, already and inescapably escalating into a violent quagmire with no easy way out.

As usual with these, the butch one-liners are memorable, the artwork is gorgeous, Jonas is cool and the villains are horrifying. "Salvaje" is perhaps not the most surprising or inventive entry into the "Undertaker" series, but it's sure no let-down either. show less

In this graphic novel a Viking settlement terrorized by a sea serpent hires a monster hunter to take care of the problem. It's a decent story and the art is good, but I kept thinking that it's really just an excuse to write Captain Ahab as a Viking.

Received via NetGalley.

Una fábula política en el estilo de George Orwell con un dibujo brillante y un argumento que engancha (aunque por momentos algo lento) Creo que los dos puntos fuertes del tomo es que es capaz de dejar claro su punto de vista sin caer en el maniqueísmo y la expresividad de la que el dibujo dota a los animales.

Interesting story set in a Europe during the religious wars period. Story follows one Hans Stalhoffer, sword master and tutor to the King of France. After losing a duel and his position to Malestranza, representative of the new approaches to warfare, Hans moves to the remote mountains of France [on a border with today's Switzerland] and starts working as an enforcer for local landlords.

Suddenly everything changes as Hans' old friend, doctor from the court, and his young protege suddenly show more arrive and ask him to help them cross over to Geneva. They are being chased by King of France's men because they carry the first translation of Holy Bible to French language. At first reluctant to risk his life (and life of his friend) for something he considers just bunch of paper Hans will find himself thrown into a fight not only with KIng's men (led by Malestranza) but also with people living in these remote regions that are slowly getting involved in the bloody religious war. It is a story with the bitter sweet ending and it worked for me.

Through all of this we see conflict of ideas - reformation moving on with the goal of bringing God to ordinary people (and thus removing the need for any intermediary like official churches and clergy) that will pave the way for great progress (social and scientific) in Europe on one hand and on another change in warfare. I will not go into long talks about how old times always look better than current times but truth be told Renaissance shook the world and then Reformation shook that greatest of all pillars - faith and started the war over it. What emerged were forces that had greater autonomy and with that proliferated conflict to much grander scale. There were no more armies of knights and nobles with their retinues fighting it off [almost one on one], now Europe saw (after a long time, Rome's being the last grand-scale armies) thousands of professional soldiers marching over it and fighting for whomever paid the most.

And this is what I think authors wanted to describe when talking about broadsword (Hans) and rapier (Metalstaza) - change of generations in which old warhorses that trained for war since they were kids are now getting replaced by citizen armies raised within short period of time, hastily trained and sent to wage war wherever their masters send them. War is no longer something that is learned and trained and lived (thus it took time and could not be started on the whim). It becomes common activity that anybody can engage in as long as they have money.

Is the story groundbreaking - of course not, but again if you ask me if we went by groundbreaking there would be 10 or 12 books on the shelves in the library. I enjoy stories of old professionals forced back from their retirement and this book fit the bill perfectly.

Art is pretty good, in some places outright gorgeous. You can feel the wetness and cold of the mountains in the winter. Action scenes are drawn very good and you can follow the sword fighting without losing orientation or asking yourself "now, how did he.....".

Pretty good book, highly recommended to action/adventure story fans. show less