By Ed Sum
(The Vintage Tempest)
Release Date:
October 7, 2020
Potential Spoiler Alert
Parts of the West Coast of North America may seem clear of the haze from the wildfires in California, but I see the future being presented to me sooner than I realize. All those orange hues in the sky certainly put me in the mood to look at the preview of issue #2, and thankfully we are not headed to that Blade Runner 2049 universe.
Well, not yet. If corporations are truly going to take over and put in measures to that future Cullen Bunn predicts in this comic, then we’re all doomed.
The life of Nadia when not on the job isn’t so bad. Unfortunately, these are flashbacks. We are seeing her fall into that rabbit hole of despair. Her head is not in the game–especially when concerning her team is not achieving that goal as established in the first issue. The post-traumatic stress she had when her previous team was gunned down is now manifesting.
She doesn’t understand why she has to keep Apex alive. He’s half man and half cyborg. The way he looks and laughs is as scary as Freddy Krueger before a kill. Props goes to Miguel Valderrama for superbly stylizing the mania, and I can’t wait for the next issue to develop the relationship between the two characters even further.
This mini-series is obviously broken into separate acts like in a traditional theatrical play. I surmise it’s more about how these two figures can help each other out ala Enemy Mine than giving readers a tease of what’s to come in the video game.
