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The
first part of a four-part crossover with Dark Horse's Buffy
series, the first half of PAST LIVES,
PART 1 moves quickly between various locations.
In
L.A., Angel is having demon trouble. A female demon hunter is
majorly pissing off the city's demon population, but for every
one that gets away, she kills at least four.
In
London, the Council of Watchers presses Quentin Travers over
an "experiment" involving Council operative, Alexa
Landry.
Back
in L.A., said operative reads Rupert Giles' notes while planning
her next move.
There's
not a great amount of Buffy in Part 1. In fact,
all we get is a couple of pages of the Buffster killing a demon
that's done a runner from L.A. and getting some advice from
Giles.
The
story certainly opens strongly. Moving from one setting to another
(an L.A. exterior, Angel Investigations, London, Alexa Landry's
hotel room and Sunnydale) gives the impression that there's
a lot going on and that the story's length will be fully justified.
The
pace slows down somewhat in the second half as we move to longer
scenes and characters exchanging dialogue rather than getting
to the dialogue. Okay, so this is always necessary but both
the Angel and Buffy strips often fall down in
this area with a bunch of crap looking demons getting far too
much exposure.
Golden's
tendency to reuse characters from his earlier works in the Buffyverse
also rears its ugly head with the return of Abner from BENEATH
THE SURFACE. He might have a part to play
in the story, but on the evidence here it looks like a piece
of rather pointless continuity. However, things look up when
Alexa Landry dons her leather gear and makes her move.
Overall,
a good start to the story. Some of the art is a bit crap and
I wish Golden would stop reusing his old characters unless they're
relevant to the plot. But, unlike many Angel and Buffy
comics with their obvious Big (well, Medium) Bad, the way the
story's heading isn't immediately apparent. Fingers crossed
for the rest of the story. BACK
TO THE TOP
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Writers:
CHRISTOPHER GOLDEN
and TOM SNIEGOSKI
Pencils: CHRISTIAN ZANIER
Inks: DIGITAL JUMP
Cover: CHRISTIAN ZANIER
Cover variations: art, photo
DARK HORSE COMICS
$2.99
RATING: 8/10
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