Saturday, July 3, 2021

Brzrkr #3 Review!

Brzkr continues with his blood-soaked origin back to the present with Brzkr back on mission and out of control!  The Boom Studios comic features writing by Keanu Reeves and Matt Kindt and art by Ron Garney.  The cover by Rafael Grampá has a suited Brzrkr next to a Brzrkr in military uniform there is a red circle behind them, the organization’s logo?  Issue #3 opens a bloody battlefield; a head staked, bodies scattered about including a horse.  It is two seasons since Brzkr was born.  It shifts from the bodies, one shadowed corpse looks like the Frank Miller, black with streaks of red.  Then, we shift back to B. leading his tribe, cutting through a body with a long axe.  Then, a series of panels of him stomping, ripping off a head, and smashing a face!  The arrow-pierced warrior asks his father if he “did well.”  His father says the village calls him “unute”; a tool and weapon.  He is not father of the ancient year.   



They ride horses and his father says the village is not safe with envious rivals outside of the valley.  Night, at the family hut, he questions his mother about being a tool.  His mother says he was a gift from the gods and he thinks she prayed for a unute.  Later, his naked mother dresses to see her husband planning an attack.  He says they are almost finished.  It is morning in the village and she wants the fighting to end.  The husband says he will keep everyone safe, semantics.  He later mentions the victories at the eastern mountains, the “river-dwellers” to the south, and the northern plainsman now he wants to assault the city to the west.  Brzrkr questions the purpose of attacking a distant city.  His father says they are a wealthy tribe, greedy, and he is sending a small group with his son.  The ruler is on his throne drinking when debris rains on his cup, then larger fragments.  



Brzrkr leaps down from the roof with two axes and two bodies.  This is where I thought this pure Conan the Barbarian.  He lands with a strong impact.  The ruler pleads for his life as B. drags him away.  He sees the guards and his eyes glow blue as he says his father’s command, “No one lives.”  Brzrkr violently kills the guards and the ruler.  His men report they took care of the rest of the guards.  He sees the commoners going about their business, but B. runs towards them with his axes!  He sits on a pile of bodies after his slaughter with the snow falling.  We hear narration about this was before the protocols.  We see Brzrkr’s face, horribly mangled, a bloody vision out of Bernie Wrightson’s Frankenstein.  His father is stunned at his appearance.  


On the horse ride back, Brzrkr questions if his father was there in the cave, he knows from the story, this is not his birth father.  He is alone outside of the family hut, his mother worries about him, but his “father” says he enjoyed the killing.  Mother goes out to her son who says he doesn’t want to be unute any more.  The warriors ride out again, his “father” says it a new tribe, there is pink lightning and a close of “father” stunned that his wife brought down that same lightning.  Another slaughtered village.  His “father” removes arrows from the back of B.  In the current day office, the doctor that was treating present day Brzrkr says he is remembering to the head of the organization, a bearded man with glasses.  She says he is on a mission to Chile.  Four of the team was killed, B. says they were too close when he was in the battle.  Brzrkr #3 is steadily building the story, but we don’t know the exact nature of the Brzrkr, his purpose beyond killing, but it is the Eternal Warrior with a black ops organization with a little Conan the Barbarian thrown in, a compelling comic book!      


Four Protocols out of Five! 


#Brzrkr, #KeanuReeves, #MattKindt, #RonGarney, #RafaelGrampa 

No comments:

Post a Comment