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So yeah, the third collected edition of the Dungeons & Dragons comicbook came out back in April, but it's not until this week that I got around to reading it.  There's been other stuff, and having read it in single issue form already, I was in no rush.

Still, as I put reviews of [url=community.wizards.com/khilkhameth/blog/2...]volume one[/url] and [url=community.wizards.com/khilkhameth/blog/2...]volume two[/url], I may as well do the third.  It's called [url=www.amazon.co.uk/Dungeons-Dragons-Volume...]Down[/url].

The cover is different to the one shown there on Amazon, by the way.  It has Khal and Varis being swept up by black... stuff in a scene that does not happen within.   There's a lot of dead space on that cover, and it's not terribly exciting.  In fact, along...

Thanks to Dark Avengers Thunderbolts #176, Supernal shall henceforth be known by its true name of x'zelzi'ohr.

While a new issue hasn't been published for a few months now (and no new ones solicited for at least the next three), the D&D comicbook will return!  Courtesy of the War Rocket Ajax podcast, writer John Rogers says that it's merely 'on hiatus' for a little bit.  Phew!

It's around the fifty minute mark...

www.comicsalliance.com/2012/05/21/war-ro... 

So the second collected edition of the D&D comicbook came out this month, and I must say that it reads better in this form than it did serialised.  The abundance of fill-in artists for Andrea DiVito is still very distracting, but the story itself flows better, as the 'cliifhangers' in this story arc aren't as strong as previous or future volumes.

The changed artists aren't bad, but they should just use their own styles rather than aping DiVito so much; continuity of style isn't the same thing as quality, unfortunately. I will say though, that the direction on the rakshasa is brilliant; the mannerisms with the backwards hands all looks so natural.  It's wonderful.

As with the previous volume, this book is hardcover and blown up in scale, but with the already-mentioned decreae in ...

So, this issue would mark the end of the first year (already?) of this comicbook being published, and the beginning of the third story arc.  Maybe second, since the first two are pretty well-connected, but this would certainly be the start of the third trade.

Anyway!  I didn't really cover the previous two issues, and I won't go back and do that now.  Uneven art and a rather rushed ending to the party being lost in the Feywild.  There was a giant robot and a rakshasa, but the book wasn't at its peak.  I might go back over that when the collection comes out.

Issue 12.  First thing, it's printed on a much lower quality paper than it previously was.  It's certainly much more flimsy than the chunky stuff that IDW usually uses, although it remains thicker

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So, I got my hands on the first collected edition of the D&D comicbook, Shadowplague by John Rogers and Andrea Di Vito, yesterday.  I was a bit surprised when it arrived, as it's a lot bigger than I was expecting, which somewhat justifies it costing more than I thought it should.  It hasn't got lots of extra pages, but instead has been published in a larger format; this isn't ttaditional comic size, and it's taller and wider even than regular D&D books.  I don't have anything to prove my theory here, but I think it's the same dimensions as those old UK-style annuals, which will of course mean nothing to anyone outside this country.

Regardless, the artwork inside looks just as excellent when blown up as it did in its original form.  No loss of deatil at all.  It

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Seems like a while since the last one came out (and I certainly didn't mention it on this blog), and it's with good reason; looks like Andrea Di Vito can't keep up with the pace, as there are two fill-in artists doing sections of this issue.  The fact that they're trying to ape the former's style really shows to their detriment.  In trying to copy, their work just comes off as stilted and uninspiring.

Still, the story is as good as ever, and pieces are starting to come together in the bigger plot moving in the background.  Seems that the random flashback that intruded a couple of issues back wasn't so random after all.  But there's still plenty of exploration into the characters too, with some treacherous gnomes, haughty-beyond-belief eladrin,angry dryads, dwarven

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As well as the current D&D comicbook series (which continues to be awesome, despite the changes in Dragonborn speech bubbles), I recently read the first volume of IDW's compilation of the old DC series.

It's very much of its time.  Quite a lot of set-up at the beginning and pretentious talking, although the characters themselves are moderately interesting.  A wise-cracking dwarf and the naive centaur that he rides into battle is weird by anyone's standards.  And after the initial story-arc it gets weirder still, as the party moves on from fighting extra-planar invaders to stopping the Guild of Jesters from destroying Waterdeep with spells cast using jokes and punchlines.

Yes...

The John Ostrander art is very, very nice though, and carries the weaker parts of the story

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Yeah, after this latest issue of the D&D comicbook, I'm going to stick with it and not bother getting any further instalments of its Dark Sun comrade.  

When compared side by side, the latter is so outclassed.  The former can manage to squeeze character development and plot progression in during fight scenes; in Dark Sun, the combats are merely a series of panels with splattering blood and sound effects,and there are quite a few of them per issue.

Dark Sun also does not contain dazzling insight into the trap disarming process of a halfling rogue, thoughts on dwarven love poetry or warnings about confusions that may arise from mis-translating into the 'Common' language...