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Sledgehammer 44 #1

By Geoff Hoppe
March 26, 2013 - 15:32

I love when Mignola’s in his wheelhouse: a silent, hulking hero, Nazi super-tech, and confused, good-willed everymen along for the ride. It’s nothing new -- especially if you’re familiar with the world of B.P.R.D. -- but it sure is fun.

 

The Obligatory Warning: charred corpses. Not terribly disturbing, but definitely PG-13.  

 

SPOILERS, fresh and not, ahead.

 

Sledgehammer 44, as this site’s three other reviews say, is a new miniseries set in the latter days of World War II in the expanded Mignola-verse (do we say that?). A group of GIs in occupied France are assigned to protect an ambulatory WMD, and they’re not sure how they feel about it. In issue #1, the Sledgehammer suit lands in France, vaporizes some Nazis, and fights a cool-looking Nazi mech. In other words, this is Mignola fan eye candy.

 

The art’s terrific. Layout and pacing are particularly impressive, considering that pp. 3-8 only show a guy waking a few steps and clanging his hands together. The shifts in perspective and point of view make that scene, and the book’s others, highly engaging. Jason Latour’s art is admirably detailed, and though Mignola’s world is traditionally made of craggy, jagged angles, Latour’s thinner lines and detailed backgrounds still work. My only sort-of complaint? The noses appear to be on loan from The Vision of Escaflowne. Now, the promised…

 

FRESH SPOILERS: which aren’t really spoilers, but elucidate the context in a way that might affect your reading. If you’ve read the other stories. And don’t remember them. Enough sentence fragments. The Sledgehammer suit seems to be the same sort of Vril suit Jim Sacks wore in Lobster Johnson: The Iron Prometheus. I’ve been only partially in the Mignola loop for awhile, so I’m not sure what other Vril suit action there’s been between Iron Prometheus and now. Still, it’s a part of the expanded universe I haven’t seen for awhile, and continuity’s always a good thing.

 

Worth the money? Mignola fans, absolutely. Yes also for casual fans, but skim it first.  

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12