Sticking it to Edna Mode.
Havoc 21 Presents #3
Wolfman Productions (Winter, 2013)
EDITORS: Eugene J. Byrne & George Amaru
Legacy Of The Falcon: “In Dreams”
WRITER/ARTIST: George Amaru
TONES: Jason Wojtowicz
LETTERERS: Daniel Chan & George Amaru
Legacy Of The Falcon: “Preludes”
WRITER: George Amaru
ARTISTS: George Amaru & Randy Silverman
LETTERERS: Franzisca Guedel & George Amaru
“Genevieve” Chapter One
WRITER: Herve Levasseur
ARTISTS: Justin Johnson & Dustin Foran
LETTERER: Franzisca Guedel
We begin with the first of two stories featuring The Falcon. Some guy named Charles is given a vision of the future, where a chosen warrior is now a superhero in our present day. However, Charles is still worried about the nightmares where an evil wizard (I think) stabbed the warrior, our titular “Falcon”, to a tree and turned him into his zombie leader. Seeing Falcon’s young allies doesn’t waylay his fears but the “angel”, who also wears the same Falcon outfit, is convinced that our hero will come through.
This story introduces the idea of the backstory for Legacy Of The Falcon but not much else. I don’t know anybody’s name except Charles and I still don’t know what he’s about or what time period he’s supposed to be in outside of the past of the current day of the comic. I do like the art, but I hope the second Falcon story in this issue gives me more to go on.
And sure enough we get a text dump, but on one page and explains everything you need without boring the reader. A knight named Sir Charles the Falcon-Hearted was chosen to become immortal and protect the portal where the necromancer Nexmanus was sent into another dimension. He knows one day that Xander Evans must take up his mission when the key to the portal is taken. That’s all I need, a summary of the important parts. Now for the second story.
A story that tells the rest. Xander is the Falcon, a superhero aided by a woman named Summer, codenamed Delphi, and using gadgets she created with his still unnamed brother. There is some action through the lore dump and Xander takes out some muggers, one of whom was about to turn rapist. However, he’d really like to find and stop Nexmanus because it’s his influence turning the city into a crime wave. I kind of wish they started with this story but if Sir Charles is supposed to learn about Xander’s future through the time travel vision I can see why they didn’t. Still, I like this story better and wouldn’t mind learning more about the character.
Our final story, which is more of a preview, starts with some more backstory of Amaru’s comic universe and its ties to magic before introducing us to Genevieve Lancaster. The folklore creatures, tired of being hunted, revealed themselves to the public and made a deal with the human governments. Of course, not all of the folklore beings are of the good guy persuasion or we wouldn’t have a comic. Genevieve is the daughter of a human and vampire who were agents assigned to deal with the bad ones, but her parents disappeared five years ago, while one year ago her lover and partner (I sense a trend) was mysteriously attacked by a gargoyle. Now she’s annoyed at getting minor assignments. She wants the one who killer her parents or her almost-fiance, or both if they’re not the same person. A bit darker concept than I’m into but the backstory has potential and the art is still good. Not sure about the font used for the lettering here. It just looks off for a comic.
Overall this is a decent introduction to the series being previewed here, and I assume Havoc 21 Presents is a preview comic. I might want to check out more of The Falcon but Genevieve really isn’t my style of story.
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