For some time now, I've been reading Don's reviews of Scion and wondering if I missed out when I gave the series a pass after the first issue. As it turns out, I have been missing out, because the first volume of Crossgen's new Traveler-sized trades reprints the first seven issues of Scion, and while it's not a perfect read, I found a lot to like here. Marz is covering similar ground to his work on Sojourn, but with slight differences including a male protagonist who is at the head of a kingdom and a world where two kingdoms are at war rather than having one dictator who has enslaved the world. Then there's the presence of a genetically-engineered race of slaves and servants who have a resistance movement seeking to free them. Basically, while the genre and general approach is epic fantasy, there are enough distinctions to make this stand on its own, separate from its better known cousin Sojourn. In Crossgen tradition, of course, the artwork is simply phenomenal and beautifully colored, and it holds up well in this smaller size.
Part of the reason why I think no one has really succeeded with fantasy comics on the scale that Crossgen has is that none of them have captured the sweeping grandeur and spectacle that mass fantasy audiences expect. That is to say, they've been missing the key ingredients of either spectacular art (which you can't say about indie epics like Bone or Thieves & Kings) or they've been missing out on bright, professional color (which you can). Scion is a treat for the eyes, as Jim Cheung grew from his role as X-Force penciller I didn't particularly care for into a fantasy artist supreme. Whether it's the clash of armies or the smaller, more personal stories such as an escape from mounted pursuit or soul-searching before and after a life-shaking event, Cheung and Hillsman never disappoint.
I do have to admit to a preference for the splashy stuff, however, because that's where the whole creative team really shines. The sequence of Ethan falling off the ship and being rescued by an undersea race is spectacular, and you can practically feel (and hear) the wind and the roar later on as the dragon cavalry whooshes over the head of the royal family before a battle. Credit here should also go to Caesar Rodriguez, whose colors are so bright and imaginative that he can stand up easily to Paul Mounts, who colors one of the chapters of the book and who is, to my mind, one of the top colorists in the industry right now. I'm reminded of the early days of Image, when the artists who came to the new company seemed to breathe new life into their work, because artists who move to Crossgen do tend to suddenly find a whole new level to their artwork, and Scion is a shining example of that.
Which seems like a good place to segue into talking about the Traveler format. I love this format. It's roughly the same size as the Tokyopop and new Viz manga that has been sweeping through the bookstores, which explains Crossgen's experimentation with it in large part, but I had some worry that color artwork might not reproduce as well at this size. As it turns out, while there is the occasional panel where the story looks a little cramped, in general the art looks as good or better as it did at full size. And it's hard to beat seven issues of full-color story for $10.
So having gushed about the artwork and the format, the only aspect of Scion left is the story, and honestly, that is where I find a couple of my points of contention. The opening sequence is reprinted from the first Crossgen Chronicles, a bloated and self-important narrative that blatantly tied the whole Crossgen universe together and made it sound like something it wasn't, and it is this short story that sort of put me off all the Crossgen stuff right in the beginning. The reprint would have been much, much stronger without it. I'm also not crazy about the sigil, which stands out as a plot device in an otherwise well-thought-out world full of political and personal intrigue, and though it is played down to some extent later on, it never quite blends in to where it feels like a necessary part of the story.
That said, overall I like the Scion story quite a bit. Marz does a nice job of establishing Ethan and his family as likable characters, and if he's a little heavy-handed with the relationship stuff in the first issue, he does ease off later and makes me believe these loving family relationships. The similarities to Sojourn are there, notably the mysterious rescuer who helps the hero run from captivity, but they fade away as the story continues and turns into more of a war/political book. The battle between the two houses that kicks off the war is particularly grand and impressive, and Marz doesn't let the reader forget the consequences of war in terms of loss of life.
When the book ended, I saw a lot of potential and several different places the story could go, and I was left asking "What happens next?" Which is a pretty solid indication to me that Scion, given a second chance, has hooked me.
