Villordsutch reviews Brass Sun #2…
Brass Sun started off with such with such a fantastic fairy-tale feel to it that it wasn’t until the story began that I discovered this beautiful orrery galaxy, designed by The Blind Watchmaker, actually existed in this universe! We are not only treated to the splendour of seeing this grow, but we get to unfortunately watch its destruction as the Blind Watchmaker entrusts the humans living on these planets with separate parts of the key to the galaxy’s source of life, the Brass Sun. Wars inevitably rage across the planets for overall control of the key and in these horrific times the locations to the fragments are lost.
We are soon following both Miss Wren, our young protagonist, and Conductor Seventeen, who has been charged by the Station Master to protect and spy on Miss Wren, across the first world of the orrery galaxy in search of the first part of the key. If the first few pages of the comic didn’t enthral you then the visions of this planet will, and the characters delivered upon this planet doubly so. From sprawling gardens and tinpot robot “Scythes” chasing our heroes across the over-grown lawns, to cable car rides through a huge metropolis; characters that occupy this world have fell straight from the days of the British Empire and the father, rather grotesquely, seems to drip from features on his face.
This is a truly fantastic comic to read; getting to the end I was upset that I hit the last page for I wanted it to continue. Ian Edginton has created a universe that is such a treat to be given that I cannot wait to see what he has planned for the future issues nor the future planets; I crave this comic to be the actual graphic novel so I can read it all now and give myself the fix. I suppose though absence in this case will make the heart grow fonder.
To really place the icing on the cake, the artwork from I.N.J. Culbard is absolutely beautiful to look at, with a touch of the good old Steampunk throughout but not over-powering; it just looks perfect. It reminds me of hand-drawn novels I used to read as a child in libraries, before the invention of graphic novels; you’d never know the title but the images would stay with you for a lifetime. The colouring too on occasion looks like washed water colours, then it can sing with heat and warmth. Brilliant.
Both Edginton and Culbard have made something here that everybody should be a part of.
Villordsutch likes his sci-fi and looks like a tubby Viking according to his children. Visit his website and follow him on Twitter.
Originally published June 25, 2014. Updated April 12, 2018.
