Friday, January 03, 2014

Booknote: Robyn Hood: Wanted

Pat Shand, et.al., Robyn Hood: Wanted. Horsham, PA: Zenescope, 2013. ISBN: 9781939683045

Right away I will say the cover for this is gorgeous as are all the covers that Zenescope puts out. It certainly would make a great poster. Now, the story inside? The story is good, but it's not great. The volume is a compilation of the series Grimm Fairy Tales Presents Robyn Hood: Wanted, Issues 1-5. Though it helps if you have read the previous series, this series can stand on its own.

This volume is the next installment in their Robyn Hood series. Robyn has saved the kingdom of Bree and earned her way back to Earth. However, things on Earth have not been great for Robyn. On Bree, she is a hero. On Earth, she is wanted for murder (for taking revenge, or exacting justice if you prefer, on men who hurt her and took one of her eyes. As usual in stories like this, the cops could not care less about her side of the story).

In this story, Robyn is brought back to Bree where Sir Guy of Gisbourne is running the kingdom with the prince son of the late King John as a puppet figurehead. The people need Robyn once more, but there are challenges along the way as Sir Guy is drawing on some very dark powers to consolidate his position. It falls to Robyn Hood to stop him and maybe learn about her origins along the way.

I found the story good but not great. There was a bit too much going back and forth between Bree and Earth, much in the form of flashbacks that reflect Robyn's ambivalence over her origin and newly found heroic role. That often broke up the narrative, and some of those parts I honestly found distracting. While the story is a nice departure from the source material, it lacks some of the swashbuckling charm many may know. It's an OK adventure, but it seems to lack a certain "oomph" so to speak. This is the first volume in a new series, so there is a cliffhanger. I may nor not seek out the next volume. It was a quick read, but in the end, that is all it was. The story art is good and adequate, but it does not seem the match the quality of the excellent art on the covers.

I am giving it 3 out of 5 stars because I did like it, but this could have or should have been a lot better.

Disclosure: The mandatory stuff I have to type to tell you that I read this as an e-book review copy via NetGalley in exchange for a fair review. You know, so The Man is satisfied everything is kosher. 

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