The BeQuest #2

The BeQuest #2

Aftershock Comics 2021

Written by Tim Seeley

Coloured by Jeremy Colwell

Lettered by Marshall Dillon

As the sword and sorcery slinging "War Party" tries to make themselves at home in modern Chicago, the mad monk Epoch Craev unleashes his beasts. Now, our heroes must venture into a dank dungeon filled with unknowable horrors: Lower Wacker Drive!

I really like the idea of this book and the more I read it the more impressed I become. The way that this issue opens up and how we learn what the team is up to is nicely done. That they’ve been exploring their new environment while off camera as it were and getting to know this new realm before being summoned to a mission per se is a great way to show them not resting on their laurels. Tim is a master storyteller and he understands how to get the most out of the story by what’s on the page and what is insinuated that happens off the page as well. So yeah I really thought that this was done in such a smart and intelligent manner.

The opening here is giving me life because it showcases different creatures from Tangea and it brings us this engagement and interest factor that is immeasurable. I’m loving how this is being told as the story & plot development we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is immaculately rendered. The character development we see continues to impress as we get to know the characters more and more. The dialogue as well as how they act and react to the situations and circumstances they encounter and boy howdy is there one huge of those. The more we see them the more varied and interesting they become. The pacing is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing more and more of the story we see both the pros and cons of this crew not being from Earth.

How we see this being structured and how the layers within the story continue to grow and evolve through the turn of the page is really stunning to see. How everything works together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as move the story forward is really nice to see. This is a team in a new place and their objective is a tad ambiguous and is becoming more defined with little tidbits of information that we see.

I said it last time and I’ll repeat that here, I believe this is the best work I’ve seen from Freddie. The creativity and imagination is so far off the charts I don’t even know where to begin with what we see. The linework is phenomenal and how the varying weights and techniques that we see elevate the quality of the detail work that we see exponentially. As someone who is a huge proponent of backgrounds I will say that how we see the composition within the panels and how that space is utilised we get this amazing 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 the brilliant eye of a master visual storyteller. The colour work that we see is stupendous. The way that the various hues and tones that we see being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work is gorgeous. There’s a true understanding of how colour works here and how contrasting hues can work together to create something amazing.

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The concept here is amazing and that we see how the multiverse being utilised in such a way that we’ve never seen before shows the kind of intuitiveness and genius that expands the possibilities infinitely. The way the story is able to pull the reader in and how you find yourself loving the characters and wanting to share in their experience as a part of the team. This kind of interaction is why Tim is one of today’s best writers and with Freddie, Jeremy & Marshall they’ve managed to create an entirely accessible multiverse in two issues that boggles and ignites the imagination.