This long-awaited project has been the focus of some controversy as it was revealed that the art was changed to make it more reader-friendly to a younger crowd and those who don't need a whole lot of gratuitous nudity for their jungle adventure stories. There's no doubt that part of the purpose here is titillation; just look at that cover. I'll be honest... if I were a 14-year-old boy, I'd be thrilled with this comic book. I'd read it over and over again. At night. In my room. Alone. But I'm 20 years removed from that time in my life, so I'm not really the target audience here. The Jurassic Park-esque adventure and action here are actually quite a bit of fun, but ultimately, the plotting seems a bit generic.
A team of U.S. soldiers who find themselves stranded on a weird island where prehistoric life -- including dinosaurs -- still thrives stumbles upon something even more weird and out of place: a German bunker and laboratory. There, they find some much-needed supplies... and a naked woman floating in some kind of gestation or incubator chamber. As they try to get some answers, they forced to release the woman from her oversized petri dish. Unbeknownst to the squadron of soldiers, they're not the only ones walking the halls of the bunker.
Cho brings a lot of detail to this story, but there's a softness to his style that's not really in keeping with the ruggedness of the action. He handles the dinosaurs quite well, though, and I appreciated the unflinching bloodiness of the soldiers' encounters with a reptilian predator. Cho's covering of the title character's nudity in the final scene is rather awkward, but then again, it does tone down the gratuitous T&A factor. I was disappointed to see that the only other female character in the book is just as impossibly shapely as the heroine of the book, and the way she thrust her butt out while warning the men of the danger that stalked them made for a rather obvious and silly stance.
One thing about the book that's intriguing is that there's not a strong sense of time in terms of setting. This could be set in the 1940s, or it could be set now. Sure, there's plenty of modern computer tech in the Nazi bunker, but in the Marvel Universe, that says nothing about when things are happpening. Cho is purposefully vague about the time, and there's something about it that's appealing. It's just a little bit mysterious, and Cho has also enveloped the title character in mystery as well. Is this a story about a new Shanna? Is it her origin? It's not clear at all, and I rather enjoyed that vague quality.
There are a number of pop-culture influences at play here. The most obvious one is Jurassic Park, but there are also hints of the various Alien movies and of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Sounds like a great foundation for an adventure story, doesn't it? The problem is that nothing here comes off as terribly fresh. The plotting is a bit scattered, and the dialogue is a bit hokey at times. 6/10
