Captain Canuck Season 5 #1

Captain Canuck Season 5 #1

Chapterhouse Publishing 2020

Written by Ho Che Anderson

Illustrated by Felipe Cunha

Coloured by Donovan Yaciuk

Lettered by Andrew Thomas

CHAPTER ONE: TERRA INCOGNITA

Michael Evans saved the world from an alien invasion and seemingly lost his brother in the process. Now, the charismatic leader of Equilibrium unveils his latest effort to protect the Earth from future threats as well as develop power and resources for the whole of civilization. However, not everyone is a believer in Michael’s vision for building a new prosperous world.

I cannot tell you how much I enjoy reading the adventures of Captain Canuck. Chapterhouse has a nice array of titles but this is the flagship title and it is extremely good. This issue starts us off with so much more than an introduction to the new Captain Canuck but there’s a depth to the story that I wasn’t really expecting. This is a sensational in so many different ways and there is such a character driven base to this that comes across in such an unexpected way and being surprised is what its all about. I want to be surprised by reading a book, nothing is worse than predictable right?, so with the way this is being written we see a really compelling story unfold before our eyes.

I am enjoying the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold and how the reader learns information is presented extremely well. How this ties directly into the character development shows considerable skill and talent as with this story one cannot exist without the other. The evolution of what we see within these pages as the story flows is unbelievable in the scope of how much we see. If this is what we are getting with the first issue I cannot wait to see what we’re going to get moving forward. The pacing is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing the story and the players within it sets up this amazing jaw dropping tale. This is high expectations and I sincerely hope that Ho Che can live up to it.

How we see this being structured and how the layers within the story are emerging, some in the most unexpected ways, and how all of this engages the reader as well captures the mind. How everything works together to create the story’s ebb & flow is beautifully done.

The interiors here are really nice. It is a traditional comic book style of the day and the linework is strong and the varying weights being utilised to bring out the detail work is really beautiful to see. I am a big supporter of seeing backgrounds int he panels as they not only flesh out the moments more but do wonders in bringing us depth perception, a sense of scale and that overall sense of size and scope to the book. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a strong, talented eye for storytelling. The colour work is pretty solid. While the characters seem to rely mainly upon solid colours and colour blocking, the backgrounds have more gradation and technique in how we see the colour laid down. The hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work is really nice to see.

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I keep saying time and again that there is some great storytelling happening in the world beyond the so-called “Big 2” and this is one of the many reasons why. There is a complex and interesting dynamic happening here and this is worthy as any other book you are reading. Fun, interesting and oh so entertaining I cannot wait to see what these creators have in store for us next.