The Harbinger #1 Advance Review

The Harbinger #1 Advance Review

Valiant Entertainment 2021

On Sale October 27th 2021

Written by Collin Kelly & Jackson Lanzing

Illustrated by Robbi Rodriguez

Coloured by Rico Renzi

Lettered by Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou

Peter Stanchek - one of the most powerful psiots on the planet, gifted with immense telepathic and telekinetic abilities - will journey from being the most feared man in the world to becoming one of its greatest protectors. This character-driven saga will introduce new allies, new villains, new costumes, and a whole new meaning for the title of Harbinger.

I am really kind of impressed with this issue. It certainly does exactly what it is supposed to do in that it garners interest, piques the curiosity and gives Peter the opportunity to be something, or someone, that he has always wanted to be but circumstances prevented or changed the course of who he’d become. As a scared, angry young man who created his own group of Psiots, the Renegades, and watching them die one after the other left him devastated and lost. He needs those people in his life that will act as a sort of cheques and balances in his life and from what we are seeing here it looks like that road may once again be travelled but this time it feels more organic than it did the first time around.

I am enjoying 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 that we see through the narration, the dialogue, the character interactions as well as how they act and react to the situations and circumstances which they encounter fleshes the characters out beautifully. I really like how their personalities are brought to the forefront here. The pacing is excellent and as it takes us through the pages introducing the story, the characters and the world they live in we’re so caught up in this it's amazing.

How we see this being structured and how the layers within the story emerge and grow does a magnificent job in opening up new avenues to be explored. It is within these layers that the story’s various arcs are being told and while some will meet up and create the bigger picture and others won’t they all add this great depth, dimension and complexity to the story. How we see everything working together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is impeccably achieved.

I’m not quite sure how I feel about the interiors yet. The style is definitely unique and how we see the linework with its varying weights and techniques being utilised to create the detail we see within the work is nicely rendered. How we see backgrounds being utilised throughout enhance and expand the moments as well as how they work within the composition of the panels to bring out the depth perception, sense of scale and the overall sense of size and scope to the story is well achieved. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a very talented eye for storytelling. The various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work show a solid eye for how colour works.

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There is a lot of promise we see in this issue. It is about time Peter reentered the Valiant universe and what better way than to do it in this kind of manner. Let him work to become the kind of man he wants to be without really knowing the full story of what he’s been through. This way when he does regain his full memories we can see what kind of person he’ll end up becoming from this. There is so much to be excited for here and I’m looking forward to seeing how one of Valiant’s most powerful entities gets his second chance at life and what he’s going to do with it. With a sensational presence and strong intriguing writing along with this great characterisation and some interesting stylised interiors the newest chapter in Peter’s life starts now.