Darrin O’Toole’s and Shawn Langley’s new superhero comic;
‘EarthRuler’ has been chosen as the first in a series of posts focused on Irish
comic titles to help encourage interest and discussion that is centred around
the ever expanding home-grown comic industry.
EarthRuler is the story of Rykaal, a humanoid from a distant
world who has crash landed on earth after being exiled from his own galaxy. On
arrival in our star system the protagonist is quick to discover that the laws
of physics and science do not apply to him and he has been endowed with an
array of powers form flight to telepathy.
He himself narrates
the events of his rebellion, exile and crash to earth to a group called the
consensus while awaiting their sentence for his disobedience against them; his
rulers.
As Rykaal begins to relive the epic events that have shaped
him and his predicament readers are shown how the alien man has become both
enemy number one on his home world and a cape-clad wonder on earth. Rykaal’s
power range and costume immediately puts him under the supermanesque umbrella
but the main characters personality is very different to the man of steel. With
issue #1 we see someone who is called a hero but who shows a range of traits
that are far from heroic. A troubled soul; bitter, clinical, self-pitying but
at the same time righteous and driven to fight for a good cause Rykaal is a
complex fellah with a lot of baggage and ridiculous super-powers to boot; what
can go wrong? . . . right?
The final pages of
this first issue offers uncertainty as to what Rykaal’s coming to earth will
mean; is he their hero or their ruler, I guess we’ll have to wait and see.!
The setup is solid but a lot is going on in this book, the
narration takes readers across a range of events and the journey is intersected
upon by an alien father and son bed time story who’s relevance isn't made
clear. The highlight both in writing and art is Rykaal’s violent exit from home
with the narration matching the depth of the black forever that is space and
the close-ups of Rykaals face as his molecules are blown upward are stellar.
Like I said previously; the last pages bring an uncertainty with regards to
Rykaal’s eligibility as a hero, his coldness to destruction and death is a
warning for the people of earth but intriguing for readers.
A super start from DOT comics that weaves an intriguing plot
with some amazing panel imagery.
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