Worlds Of Aspen 2015
Aspen Comics (May, 2015–digital copy)
LETTERER: Josh Reed
EDITORS: Vince Hernandez & Frank Mastromauro
All credits come from the Grand Comics Database. They’re not in the two comic stories of the flipbook themselves, so they might be using the ones from the promos. If they’re wrong, at least it’s not my fault. -_*
Eternal Soulfire
WRITER: JT Krull
PENCILER: Alex Konat
INKERS: Mark Roslan & Gabe Carrasco
COLORIST: Federico Blee
Fathom Blue
WRITER: Vince Hernandez
ARTIST: Claudio Avella
COLORIST: Erick Arciniega
Both stories are self-contained tales setting up their separate series, which I like to see in a Free Comic Book Day offering. In our first story, a young teen is read a bedtime story about magic and dragons, but her dad says that real magic doesn’t exist. Tell that to the woman with wings and an extending spear who busts into a drug den to kill another guy with wings. Meanwhile, the teen has a winged secret of her own.
I didn’t even know Aspen had stories outside of the Fathom universe. While not really my kind of story (though I’ve been surprised before), it does a decent job of introducing the world without answering the questions that should make a reader curious enough to look into the series. There’s some good action and the art is up Aspen’s usual high quality.
However, we aren’t avoiding Michael Turner’s creation in the flip story. A group of Blue take on a guy from the Deep that’s decided to burn Italy. Three young warriors try to stop him, but it’s an Elite Blue that finally talks him down. The different is this crew seems to be working for the general that has been harassing the underwater people in the other previews we’ve seen and there’s still more in tubes. What’s going on? This new spinoff series will presumably answer that.
We learn that these Blue are so human the Deep guy (something we’ve only seen mentioned in passing in previous previews) doesn’t even see them as fellow Blue. They have powers. The young mission leader, trying to prove that he and his two comrades are worthy members of the team, is 85 but doesn’t look it. The Deep guy answers to the Elite Blue. The jerk general does chastise them for destroying a church in a failed attempt to take the guy down, so he believes in limiting collateral damage. The other male member of the trio is into had “humie” comedy, but the sole lady member isn’t dealing with his nonsense. It’s a good introduction to this new group in the Fathom saga, though a lot won’t make sense if you haven’t been exposed to the Fathom universe. An outside reader will probably think it’s the same universe as Eternal Soulfire, which I don’t believe is the case.
Overall it’s a good introduction to two of Aspen’s series. They’re self-contained but tease the larger worlds of their respective series, which is what a Free Comic Book Day should do in my opinion. It might be free, but it cheapens the experience of the event to not have a full story. And it does so while making one potentially curious in the full series. This is actually the last of the Aspen comics I got free from Drive Thru Comics, so we’ll have to see what will be taking over the Thursday spot in “Yesterday’s” Comic.
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