Storyline: Spellbound
Date: May 29th, 2008
Price: $2.99 US
Writer: Joseph Michael Linsner and Eva Hopkins
Artist: Joseph Michael Linsner

Synopsis: Ivory gets in over her head as she explores the underbelly of New York City nightclub life: the secret world of the bloodsuckers. Hidden doors are suddenly opened, and clandestine societies are revealed. Ivory’s new “friends” are out to show her that blood really is thicker than water…

Opinion: Alright, I’ll admit it - after the bliss of delving back into Linsner’s imagination and artwork - the hypnosis has worn off a bit and the luster is fading already in issue number two of Joseph Michael Linsner and Eva Hopkins’ Dark Ivory mini series. What started as a somewhat interesting story, covering a fairly worn out topic has turned typical and mundane for me. It wasn’t all bad, though - there were some parts that were enjoyable, I’m not trying to be a negative nelly here and I for sure will be sticking the stoiry out. Sometimes a mini series hits a hiccup towards the middle, and I’m a loyal reader, if nothing else!

Read my full review after the jump.

Alright, let’s get the bad out of the way right off the bat. This issue felt like it was a victim of it’s own villain, like the lifeblood of the plot was completely sucked out in favor of catering to a lesser intelligence and trying to distract the reader away from that with pretty art.

You know, maybe I am getting old. This story had me literally rolling my eyes about halfway through; maybe it was the early 90’s era ‘romance reveal’, the heavy emphasis on an out-of-style goth lifestyle, the stereotypical rave experience, or just the fact that with Vampires, there’s barely any surprises in store anymore. I felt this issue wasn’t plotted very well, and the portion of character development that was revealed in dialogue just felt like ground we had already covered in the first issue.

Either way - the pacing was very slow and by and large the events were either predictable or uninspiring. The last page revelation just felt out of place and the events leading up to it were just too… romantic maybe? Not in the lovey-dovey sense, but in the more fancy images and symbolism in place of events unfolding kind of cop-out.

Now, for the good. While the story waned a bit, the artwork as always was very good. I wish there was more good in this book, and I know complimenting the artwork in a Linsner book is predictable; but in reality this is all I felt this book had to offer: pretty pictures.

That said, I will be on board for issue number 3, I’m willing to bet that this next issue will deliver and I would reommend if you felt like I did to just stick it out. I have faith that Eva and Joseph are going to turn this into something beatuiful, in spite of a hiccup midstride.

If your budget is stretched, I’d say it’s ok to skip this issue of the mini series, as cracking open number three will most likely give you about all the info you’ll need about what happened in this issue.

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