Leroy Douresseaux on AFTER DARK #3

AFTER DARK #3

RADICAL PUBLISHING

 

CREATORS: Antoine Fuqua and Wesley Snipes

WRITER: Peter Milligan
ARTIST: Leonardo Manco
PAINTS: Kinsun Loh, Jerry Choo, Sansan Saw
LETTERS: Clayton Cowles
COVER: Tae Young Choi
56pp, Color, $4.99

His legal troubles did not stop movie producer and actor Wesley Snipes, best known for the Blade film franchise, from helping to create a comic book. With director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day), Snipes created After Dark, a science fiction comic book miniseries from Radical Publishing. Hellblazer alums Peter Milligan and Leonardo Manco actually produce the comic book, with Milligan the scriptwriter and Manco the artist.

Set in the future, After Dark takes place on an Earth that exists in a state of near-perpetual darkness. Civilization is mostly confined to domed cities, with Solar City being the most populated. The populace either lives in a drug-addled stupor or engages in rioting because of boredom. The rulers of Solar City decide that Angel, a messianic figure who hasn’t been seen in decades, can tame the populace. They enlist Omar, a Bedouin drifter, to guide a rag-tag team composed of specialists and known criminals into the wilds outside Solar City to find Angel.

As After Dark #3 opens, words gets out that Angel has been found and that she is coming to Solar City. That means a happy ending, right? It’s not that simple and neither is Angel, and friends become enemies.

I give credit to the creators for making this last issue of After Dark so… dark. It’s gritty, violent, tragic, and even for a few, small moments, poignant. At 150 pages of narrative, one would think that this story is long enough. It’s not. After Dark isn’t a miniseries so much as it is an epic, and there needed to be much more room in the story for the characters. It is almost as if Peter Milligan’s storytelling is too big for this miniseries. Still, After Dark is an interesting, darker-than-usual, dystopian fiction that offers a large, rich assortment of attention-grabbing ideas and elements.

B+

Leroy Douresseaux on After Dark #2

AFTER DARK #2

RADICAL PUBLISHING
CREATORS: Antoine Fuqua and Wesley Snipes
WRITER: Peter Milligan
ARTIST: Leonardo Manco
PAINTS: Kinsun Loh, Jerry Choo, Sansan Saw
LETTERS: Clayton Cowles
COVER: Francesco “Matt” Mattina
56pp, Color, $4.99

After Dark is a Radical Publishing comic book series created by director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day) and actor Wesley Snipes (Blade). This science fiction series is actually written by Peter Milligan (Hellblazer).

After Dark is set in the future on an Earth that exists in a state of near-perpetual darkness. Civilization is mostly confined to domed cities, with Solar City being the most populated. Some of the populace lives in a drug-addled stupor; others riot either because they have a cause or because they are bored. The rulers of Solar City decide that Angel, a messianic figure who hasn’t been seen in decades, can tame the populace. They enlist Omar, a Bedouin drifter, to guide a rag-tag team composed of specialists and known criminals into the wilds outside the city to find Angel.

After Dark #2 opens in the disastrous aftermath of Omar’s mission to save the ill Trooper Jones. Now, the Bedouin is left in the darkness with Ana, a femme fatale, and the gang brawler, “Monster” Monclare. The trio eventually rejoins the mission and the group resumes the trip to Angel’s last known location, Archipelago City, where they find more than they expected.

This second issue of After Dark is a much better read than the first. For one thing, Peter Milligan does something at which he is immensely good: write character drama for science fiction, fantasy, and horror, and After Dark is a blend of all three. Getting to know these characters makes the story a much better read, and, combined with the interesting plot twists and quirks, the characters make After Dark that much more attractive. As usual, anything drawn by Leonardo Manco is good graphical storytelling, and the paints by the team of Kinsun Loh, Jerry Choo, Sansan Saw bring out Manco’s best artistic traits.

Fans of post-apocalyptic science fiction comic books and Peter Milligan’s work will want to try After Dark.

B+