White Lily #2

White Lily #2

Red5 Comics 2021

Created & Written by Preston Poulter

Pencilled by Lovalle Davis

Inked by Walden Wong & Diana Greenhalgh

Coloured by Alonso Espinosa

Lettered by Taylor Esposito

In this issue, the pair are thrown into combat missions as the Battle of Stralingrad drags on. Witness the retelling of the first ever historical occasion where a woman shot down an enemy plane. Watch as a love triangle unfolds between Katya's budding sapphic emotions for Lilya and Lilya's whirlwind romance with Alexei. Marvel at the massive air battles over Stralingrad.

I have to admit that this is one hell of a story and it’s nice to see that we’re getting a perspective from the Russian point of view. All too often all we see is American or British forces during WWII so that these women played such a vital role in the war effort for Mother Russia are finally getting the respect and attention they deserve is a wonderful thing. Also I don’t know much about them so I have no idea how much of this is based on fact or just assumption as the characterisation which i’ll get into later is mighty strong it does make you wonder about these folks to the point of looking them up to see who they were in real life.

I do like the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see there through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented extraordinarily well. The character development here is completely outstanding and I the personalities that we see through the dialogue, actions and how they act and react to the situations and circumstances they encounter is amazing in fleshing them out. The pacing here is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing the twists & turns along the way we really find an affinity for these people.

How we see this being structured and how the layers within the story continuing to grow, evolve and strengthen in some really interesting ways. How Lilya manages to weave her way through love, anger and the desire to fly is really rather quite impressive. How we see the way that everything works together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is exceptionally well laid out.

The interiors here are gorgeous! The linework here is laid down incredibly well and with the varying weights and techniques we see utilised to create this level and quality of detail is astonishing. The planes realism and how it we see them here is incredible and the painstaking time to get the details right are admirable. How we see backgrounds being utilised to enhance the moments but also bring us depth perception, a sense of scale and that overall sense of size and scope to the book. Plus the air fight pages are bloody brilliant work. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a marvellous eye for storytelling. The colour work is gorgeous. How we see the various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work is rendered exceptionally well. Plus i’m utterly impressed with how we see the sky in the air fights with all those blues and whites, that’s some impressive work and demonstrates a great eye for how colour works.

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I think this is an important book because it isn’t your standard point of view and we usually see this being translated and imported through various companies. Plus that it’s focus is on women who were the first to serve in the Russian Air Force during wartime which makes this even unique. It is an important part of history and it is just incredibly well written and the interiors are stunningly gorgeous so make sure this is a part of your reading list.