Summoners War: Legacy #2

Summoners War: Legacy #2

Skybound Entertainment/Image Comics 2021

Written by Justin Jordan

Illustrated by Luca Claretti

Coloured by Giovanna Niro

Lettered by Deon Bennett

Rai hasn’t been a summoner long, but she’s already unleashed an ancient monster beyond control! Now Rai, mentor Abuus Dein, and proto Tomas must defeat this titan capable of annihilating entire armies…but there are summoners trapped on the battlefield who would gladly see them fail.

I really like that this series just gets right into the action as a way to showcase what its about, especially for those like myself who’ve never heard of much less played the game. I also really like the pace at which this story flows and by putting the reader right into the thick of things is a much better way to learn about what this is all about than some long winded information set up. This way seeing the characters under pressure in a high risk situation we’re going to be able to learn more about them than you could possibly imagine. Justin is one of the best underrated writers working today and if you want to see why or just read a smartly written and entertaining book than you need to pick this up.

I am a big fan of the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceptionally well. The character development is phenomenal to see! With the dialogue, the character interaction as well as how they act and react to the situations and circumstances continue to flesh them out beautifully. The pacing is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing more and more of the story as well as the twists & turns keeps us so invested and involved in what is happening.

I like how we see this being structured and how the layers within the story continue to grow, evolve and strengthen. These layers are where we see things happen and the depth and complexity not to mention a chance to see different perspectives from the lesser characters. It makes me want to see more of these other Summoners. How we see everything working together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is extremely well achieved.

Love the interiors here. The linework is spectacular! How we see the varying weights and techniques being utilised to showcase this delightful detail work is stupendous. The creativity and imagination that we see is beautifully showcased and this mainly comes in the creatures that are summoned. I’m not going to suggest more backgrounds because of the setting this is in still because of the very nature of the book we get some perfect depth perception, sense of scale and the overall 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 we see is astonishingly well rendered. If you look at the big bad and you see those various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work is mindbogglingly good. This carries on throughout each character and the backgrounds and it really brings this to life in a spectacular fashion while demonstrating a brilliant eye for how colour works.

Our main characters are still trying to learn about each other and themselves and in the midst of battle Rai is showing her age. Justin portrays these character to perfection and he really understands what it means to infuse reality into how we see this fantasy story playing out. I cannot stress how much I am enjoying this and I hope you give this is a chance because in all honesty you aren’t going to find anything like it.