Comic World News

April 22, 2008:
CWN and the Grand Finale! -

February 4, 2008:
In Conclusion - David ends his CWN run with Tezuka's MW from Vertical

February 2, 2008:
Acting Like You Have Nothing to Prove -

February 2, 2008:
The Shoegazer Returns - A New Year Begins, And Our Narrator Makes A Pledge

January 30, 2008:
Tim's Reviews -

September 13, 2007:
Wizard World Chicago Loot, Part One - Stykman, Empty Chamber, the Ztarian Saga, and yes, Little Bunny Foo Foo

February 15, 2007:
I Come Not to Bury Nick Cage... - But to mourn the death of my punchline

November 20, 2006:
The End - Rich's last Chicks & Romance

November 8, 2006:
Joann Sfar's Klezmer - And a Front Racks Hiatus

October 4, 2006:
This Month's Guest: Dave Gibbons - From the pages of Elephantmen!

September 18, 2006:
Back in Berlin - or How I spent my summer

July 29, 2006:
KICKING UP A STORM - An interview with David Lloyd

June 19, 2006:
You Ain't Never Had A Friend Like Me. - Graeme looks at Spidey's "genies"

December 18, 2005:
Disappointed - Sad news for fans of Busiek's CONAN, Stephen King, and others

December 13, 2004:
JUSTICE UNPLUGGED 2 at last !!! - By Fabrice Sapolsky & Xavier Fournier

December 2, 2004:
THE TWELFTH AND FINAL STEP - Say it ain't so, Dan.

November 23, 2004:
The importance of editing -

September 29, 2004:
Mystery and Conundrum indeed! - Where in the world is Jason Pomerantz?

September 13, 2004:
Hello and Goodbye and Hello Again - Change is in the air at CWN and it smells sweet.

August 12, 2004:
The Rise of the Web Toon - New Business Model or Dumb Luck?

July 30, 2004:
The Name Says it All... - Spin Doctors revamp Boomerang.

July 27, 2004:
Bigger Isn't Always Better -

June 8, 2004:
Pre-emptive Strike: MoCCA Arts Festival - Looking forward to the con, rather than looking back at it

The Layer Method
Our top Secret time-saving technique for creating and merging balloons and tails in Illustrator.

Friday, September 3, 2010

Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet

Review by Michael May

Written by Paul Daly

Illustrated by Steve Bryant and Chad Fidler

Published by AdventureStrips.com

From the title, it's obvious what crowd Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet is going for. If you like Indiana Jones and Lara Croft, Paul Daly and Steve Bryant are hoping you'll also enjoy the adventures of their heroine Athena Voltaire. Athena is a pilot and Hollywood stuntwoman who moonlights by flying adventurers around the globe. If Jake (the pilot with the snake) from Raiders of the Lost Ark was the hero instead of Indy - and if he was really hot - he'd be Athena Voltaire.

Not your usual ink-and-paper comic, Athena Voltaire is a web strip. It comes out a page a week at AdventureStrips. Every Tuesday, a new page is featured for free. Or, for about three bucks a month or thirty for the year, you can access the entire archive of Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet (as well as the other strips on the AdventureStrips site). Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet is only 12 pages long at this point and will be a complete story only when it's finished. Rather than wait until then, I'm going ahead and reviewing the story thus far.

The story is set in the '30s or '40s. The exact year is a little vague, but that's probably a strength as I would have been looking for historical inaccuracies had I been able to put a precise time to it. Not that there are any. I don't really know. I was far more interested in the feel of the thing than the accuracy of the details. Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet feels a lot like the old movie serials that inspire it. Each page ends in a cliffhanger - something that's important in standard comics, but is vital in a web strip like Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet. There's plenty of great flavor, too. When Athena and her companions stop over in Casablanca, Athena mentions a great bar that she knows of and books them all rooms in the Hotel Americain, a thinly disguised version of Rick's Caf� Americain from Casablanca. If that's not enough, Sidney Greenstreet's Casablanca character Signor Ferrari is renamed Ferrani and plays a significant role as one of Athena's friends and the owner of a plane that she rents to take her clients to Tibet.

I haven't mentioned the Nazis and secret societies, but Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet has those, too. What you won't find is cheesecake. While Athena may indulge in the occasional cream cheese dessert, you won't see her taking a shower or getting ready for bed. Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet is about a different kind of action and excitement. Any sexuality is left completely to the reader's imagination.

When Steve Bryant approached me about reviewing his web strip, I wasn't sure what to expect from the art, but I certainly didn't expect the professional quality that I actually saw. Bryant's style and ability remind me of Lan Medina who did such beautiful work on Vertigo's Fables. Bryant understands visual storytelling and knows how to draw not only people and faces, but airplanes and castles and cities in the desert. His Signor Ferrani looks exactly like Sidney Greenstreet and he has created a look for Athena Voltaire to make men fall instantly in love.

I don't usually mention colorists in my reviews, but Chad Fidler is incredible. As good as Bryant's pencils are, Fidler's work makes them better and makes one wonder why Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet isn't already being sold in comic book shops around the country. It's as good as anything by Top Cow, which shouldn't come as a surprise considering Fidler has worked for Top Cow as well as Marvel.

For anyone who'd like a free preview of Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet, Athena has her own site at www.athenavoltaire.com. There you'll find the beginning of a separate story entitled Athena Voltaire and the Flight of the Falcon that will give readers a good idea of what to expect from Athena Voltaire and the Terror in Tibet. Also on Athena's personal site are comments from Athena fans like Tim Bradstreet, Mark Schultz, and Mike W. Barr.