THE INVINCIBLE RED SONJA #3 – Review

In THE INVINCIBLE RED SONJA #3, available from Dynamite Comics on July 14th, 2021, Red Sonja undertakes the bounty to find the missing Crown of Erkhara but not everyone wants Sonja to find it, and the thief has a greater crime in mind.

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The Details

• Written By: Jimmy Palmiotti, Amanda Conner
• Art By: Moritat
• Colors By: Matt Carter
• Letters By: Dave Sharpe
• Cover Art By: Dominica Cosplay Variant
• Cover Price: $3.99
• Release Date: July 14, 2021

Was It Good?

Compared to the previous two issues, the story is finally picking up steam into some imaginative places.

The cast of characters is unique. The mystery surrounding the crown’s theft is more complex (and magical) than anyone suspects. And the thief intends to use the crown to commit a more heinous act that promises big conflicts for the crimson-haired She-Devil.

In addition to the improvement in the story over the vanilla sword & sandal narrative of the first issue, the dialog and character moments between Red Sonja and her winged partner, Tuma, are quite good.

That said, there are two down points in this issue that hold it back from being anything but a semi-average issue — the pacing and the linework.

The pacing in this issue drags the reading experience down to a snail’s pace. There is so much dialog to wade through that you feel like it takes forever to get through the first few pages. To be fair, the dialog matches the scenes and the character’s voices, but some of it is just unnecessary and it drags the pace down.

The linework is rough. We’ve had a middling reaction to Moritat’s pencils/inks in this series so far. Nothing about those feelings has changed with this issue. If anything, the art may have taken a half step back here.

When pages have multiple panels or a single page is one large scene, both needing a lot of detail work, the quality drops. Details look scribbled and rushed. To be fair again, the central character in each panel or page gets a maximum amount of attention to hold the reader’s focus, but once you start looking at the details around that character, the art starts to fall apart.

This has the potential to be an excellent story but the lackluster art and the glacial pacing hold it back.

What’s It About?

[SPOILERS AHEAD – Click here if you just want the score without spoilers]

Red Sonja interrogates members of the King’s Court to tease out clues about who might have stolen the crown. Read our THE INVINCIBLE RED SONJA #2 review to find out why the crown is more important than simply as an ornament.

There’s political conflict as the King wants his men to find it first before Red Sonja as having an outsider find it would be deemed as though he’s unfit to control his kingdom.

Exhausting any leads through simple questioning, Sonja decides the thief can only go to one man to sell it, Bahira Yakootah. Local ruffians are reluctant to give up Yakootah’s location, so Sonja is forced to get more aggressive with her sword.

Meanwhile. Yakootah is visited by the thief in disguise and offered the crown if he will perform a very special task. We conclude the issue with Yakootah accepting the offer and summoning some really nasty demons to assist.

Final Thoughts

THE INVINCIBLE RED SONJA #3 turns the corner for the series into an interesting mystery with massive brawls, weird creatures, and malicious magic wielders-. However, the muddy pacing and muddier art hold the issue back from being an enjoyable issue to read.

Score: 6/10