Red Atlantis #2

Red Atlantis #2

Aftershock Comics 2020

Written by Stephanie Phillips

Illustrated by Robert Carey

Coloured by Rosh

Lettered by Troy Peteri

The Cold War is hot again as Russian sleeper agents with mind-control abilities exploit America's political divide and sow lethal dissent. Unexpectedly thrown into this world of science-fiction espionage, Miriam Roberts is left to question her government's motives and even her own identity.

Well It feels like it’s been a minute since the last issue. So it took a minute to catch up to speed but once you do we really dive into the action here. I’m not that big a fan of seeing something happen and then working our way up to how that occurs unless it’s the beginning of the first issue and the rest of the arc is spent telling how we got there. This issue feels a little haphazard to me as a result. Don’t get me wrong the story is here and it’s moving forward but i’m not sure it’s structured as well as it could be.

The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information isn’t as strong as i’d like it to be. As Alexander, Nitkin, tries to explain what is going on and that Miriam isn’t really having much of it isn’t a stretch, it’s actually quite refreshing that she’s as skeptical as she is. After seeing a photograph of herself as a baby with her birth parents one would think she’d be a little more open to listen. Sure what he has to say sounds like some crazy science fiction novel but what she does next left me puzzled. That and the fact she gets taken to F.B.I. Headquarters and is treated less like a victim which of course for anyone whose been stopped by a cop knows your guilty until proven innocent.

The character development is pretty strong and while there are some things I question the way they act and react to the situations and circumstances really do flesh them out rather quite well. The pacing we see is okay and as it takes us through the pages getting us to the opening and beyond we see a whole lot that kind of leaves me puzzled. Hopefully things will clear up next issue, the concept here is great and the cliffhanger ending certainly leaves us hanging so yeah we all want to come back and see what happens next.

I am digging the interiors here. The linework we see and how the varying weights and even techniques are utilised throughout to showcase this level and quality of detail work is stunning to see. Also that we see such attention paid to the backgrounds we see is fantastic, yes I would like to see more, I am not a fan of stark white backgrounds. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a good solid eye for storytelling. The colour work is really something. I like how we see the various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work here.

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I really am intrigued by this book. There is something here that captures the readers’ imagination incredibly well and we want to see it play out. While I may be critical of some aspects of it that’s what I’m here to do, not sugar coat and say oh this is great. There are a few mechanical problems that affect the ebb & flow but overall this is an extremely intriguing and enjoyable book.