James Bond Agent of Spectre #005

James Bond: Agent of Spectre #005

Dynamite Entertainment 2021

Written by Christos Gage

Illustrated by Luca Casalanguida

Coloured by Heather Moore

Lettered by Simon Bowland

The SPECTRE Civil War reaches its explosive conclusion! Who will come out on top, the established Ernst Stavro Blofeld or the upstart Titania Jones? Either way, will James Bond -- and the world -- survive? Can 007 use this war to bring SPECTRE down from within...or will he end up just one more casualty?

Oh I so don’t want this series to end! The Agent of Spectre arc may be over but here’s wishing a new arc is hot on its heels. I have to give it up to Christos for this arc and this issue in particular because not once was I able to see some of what was coming and here more so than not. We left off with Titania having shown up on Blofeld’s island with enough time to have turned his own men against him, not all of them but enough of them. We pick up right where we left off and I’m thankful for that. That this is the most action packed finale to an arc shouldn’t go unnoticed either as it really makes a great impact upon the reader.

I really like the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold is presented exceptionally well. The character development that we see through the dialogue, the character interaction as well as how they act and react to the situations and circumstances which they encounter does wonders in fleshing the characters out. I really like the way all this transpires to how they are portrayed throughout the book. The pacing here is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing more of the story right on up to its cliffhanger ending is so well done.

I like the way that we see this being structured and how the layers within the story continue to grow, evolve and strengthen. I love seeing how we see the layers holding the characterisation, twists and revelations and whether they work within the main arc or simply swirl around it they add depth, dimension and complexity to the story. There really are some of these wow and wth moments that just capture your mind and imagination leading you to want to see more. How everything works together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is achieved extremely well.

The interiors here are pretty solid. I like how we see the linework it is strong, clean and crisp and how the varying weights create the detail work is extremely nice to see. Not going to lie I wish we’d see more backgrounds all the fighting and the colour work is nice and all but it doesn’t really replace seeing where all this fighting happens. Still how we see the composition within the panels show depth perception, a sense of scale and that all over sense of size and scope to the story. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show an extremely talented eye for storytelling. The colour work is great and how we see the various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work is fantastic.

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I have said it tall along that this is what I envision when I think of James Bond and it holds true right up until the last page. I’ve enjoyed this being as much a mental game as it is a physical one and yes he got to show his lady loving skills, though i’m waiting for the bi-sexual bond to show up, and it has encompassed what we’ve come to know, expect and love about the man, the myth the legend. With strong writing and characterisation in some dynamic interiors this needs to be an ongoing monthly series.