Spirit Summer Issue
Darwyn Cooke has completed six issues of the retooled The Spirit series, and for this DC Comics "Summer Special" of the Spirit (#7) he contributes the cheesecake/beefcake cover artwork (hey, where are his nipples?) Inside, though, is Jordi Bernet, Chris Sprouse, Karl Story, and Kyle Baker handling the art chores. Three brief Spirit tales are packed into this 36-page comic, written by Walt Simonson ("Harder than Diamonds"), Jimmy Palmiotti ("Synchronicity"), and Kyle Baker scripting his own tale ("Hard Cell").Baker has the strongest story, and though laced with humor it is darker than the usual Darwyn Cooke fare. His kinetic artwork is slabbed with large blacks, and this helps create the mood, and also obscures a little bit the grisly nature of his tale.
The Jodi Bernet/Jimmy Palmiotti tale suffers from the unevenness of Bernet's artwork. The story is Spirit "lite' and Bernet's straightforward cartoon approach fits the tale, but the action element is missing. It's the Spirit halfway to camp.
The Simonson scripted "Harder Than Diamonds" has meticulous artwork from Chris Sprouse and Karl Story. It looks pretty stiff compared to the other artists in this issue, but the artwork has some fine moments, and the coloring by Dave Stewart goes a long way toward filling in a more detailed visual world than either Bernet or Baker bother with in their stories.
The Spirit #7
$2.99 Cover Price
Cover dated August 2007 (Purchased June 2007)
The Darwyn Cooke Index for this web site is here.
- Twitter feed unable to load
