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Harbinger #3 Advance Review

By Andy Frisk
August 13, 2012 - 13:09

Peter Stancheck remarks that the first "day of school is always the worst," but his first day as a freshman member of the Harbinger Foundation's school for its psiots is more than both he and many members of the school bargained for. Meanwhile, Toyo Harada consults with a character not seen since the first issue, and the knowledge he seeks, and receives, remains troubling for both him and Peter...

Introducing us to the inner sanctums of The Harbinger Foundation, and continuing to further muddy the moral distinction between who in Harbinger is the villain and who the hero, Joshua Dysart continues to drive forward, with some great characterization and plot development, Valiant Entertainment's most dark, serious, and intelligent work. Dysart's piercing look into Harada and Stanchek's world, and the dichotomies that they represent, is nothing short of brilliant, but it is incredibly dark. That's a good thing though. Dysart is taking on some serious metaphoric and allegorical questions here through his characters, and the type of humor (which is also brilliant in itself) that Fred Van Lente has introduced in Archer and Armstrong just wouldn't work, or honor the spirit of the original Harbinger, here. Harbinger and Archer and Armstrong are polar opposites in tone, and beautifully balance out the Valiant Universe.

Artist Khari Evans gets to illustrate a pretty drastic change in setting in Harbinger #3. Switching from the suburbs of Pittsburgh to downtown Pittsburgh (which, by the way, is an absolutely awesome setting since I grew up there!), and from abandoned homes to the posh and polished innards of the Harbinger Foundation, is no challenge for Evans as he continues to bring Harbinger to brilliant, and a bit frighting, life.

It's getting incredibly hard to come up with new ways to praise Harbinger (and all of Valiant's books thus far) month after month. It's a great problem to have though. Harbinger is the rare kind of book that not only hold your attention, it leaves you dying for more.

  

Rating: 10 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12