Tony Black reviews Kong of Skull Island #3…
Volcanic eruptions and political overtakings—the Kongs struggle against the horrors of Skull Island.
SEE ALSO: Check out a preview of Kong of Skull Island #3 here
It feels as though quite an immense amount happens in the third issue of Kong of Skull Island, which begins with James Armus giving us a crucial preface which reminds us of the Tagu and Atu tribes, their differences, and presents the idea of a storyteller after the fact writing down the events that led to either the union or the destruction of this civilisation, divided by ritual & pageantry revolving around the apes they had genetically bred into the Kong’s of the title, who play a much bigger role as their power and strength come to place both tribes in peril while their own island begins to crack at the seams. While Armus establishes a great deal for the battles and adventures to come on Skull Island later, it feels like a messy issue in terms of plot & narrative, and still the characters & their interrelationships feel confusing.
Armus has from the beginning been as interested in the tribal geo-politics of the Tagu & Atu as he is the idea of giant monsters knocking seven bells out of each other, and that’s quite right – a central part of King Kong is the relationship between beast & man, and that’s something he explores here through Ewata and the Kong she commands. It always feels more interesting a story however when Armus is pointing in that direction, rather than when a mass of characters with arcane names who look & sound quite similar are debating this & that, or trying to one-up each other – that’s just grist for the mill, filling the bloodied and vivid panels from Carlos Magno before we get to the Kong’s & ships travelling oceans and the bigger story of a civilisation forced to unite on the eve of their own destruction. There’s an equal sense of destiny involved too, as Skull Island looms on the horizon, but throughout you almost wish we could get there faster and skip the twists and turns of some rather uninteresting characters.
Though it propels the story along and is filled with incident, this might be the least effective issue of Kong of Skull Island yet, with almost too many similar and rather dull characters in the mix and not enough of a clear narrative through line to really hook in and maintain the interest. It looks good, and Magno really ups the blood & gore, especially at the end, but the writing is just lacking something. The conclusion however suggests a much more exciting fourth issue to come.
Rating: 6/10
Tony Black
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Originally published September 14, 2016. Updated December 16, 2019.
