As a fan of Gargoyles, I was naturally intrigued to see if being continued, in a canonical way, in the form of comics. Any Gargoyles fan worth his salt knows that Season 3 of the show was a huge bust, with show creator Greg Weisman forced off and a resulting dip in quality. Last year, way before Buffy thought up the idea, the announcement was made that the real Season 3 would be coming to us in comics form, and I just had to check it out for old time’s sake.

It’s been a bumpy ride, but with the last couple of issues, the series finally feels like it’s living up to the promise of both the original cartoon and comments made about the comic launch. Which is why it’s disappointing to pick up Issue 7 and find it a complete chore to get through.

It’s told in a non-linear fashion, which isn’t a crime in itself, but in comics it can be very hard to do right, and this …doesn’t do it right. Comics are a visual medium. To set the scene properly in a certain time period, you need to be focusing on the plot AND look - just jamming a caption at the top of a panel that says “November 2nd,” having a single line of dialogue from one character who isn’t even in an identifiable location, and then repeating the practise several times in a row goes beyond “non-linear” through “disjointed” and finally pops out somewhere around “seemingly random.”

And it can’t be just me, admittedly already a Gargoyles fan, who is baffled by the vast scope of the cast. I counted slightly under 30 separate pre-established characters appearing in the book. Some for just a panel, yes, but trying to remember who I’m looking at, sometimes in their first comic appearance, is very difficult. One of Gargoyles’ strength is its cast, but that doesn’t mean you can use them all in one issue, nor does it mean you can neglect to tell the reader who they are. If this book needs anything, it’s a Dramatis Personae page at the front explaining some of who we’re seeing.

It’s all a pity, anyway, because the story, about Macbeth trying to safeguard the Stone of Scone (though it’s not ever referred to as that, which I see has confused some reviewers who are unaware of the significance of it) is quite good once you actually unravel it. I have a bad feeling the rest of the arc is going to jump about all over the timeline too, though, so if that’s the case, things aren’t looking great for the next few issues…

Tags: Gargoyles
Publisher: Slave Labor