In NINJAK #3, available from Valiant Entertainment on September 15th, 2021, Ninjak and Myna arrive at the home of former MI6 head Neville Alcott to search for a lead about the terrorist group, Daylight, and their enigmatic leader, Kingmaker.
The Details
- Written By: Jeff Parker
- Art By: Javier Pulido
- Colors By: Javier Pulido
- Letters By: Javier Pulido
- Cover Art By: Fernando Dagnino (cover A)
- Cover Price: $3.99
- Release Date: September 15, 2021
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Was It Good?
It’s an interesting issue in that you learn the origin of the mysterious siblings with mind-reading powers from the first issue. While there’s some ninja fighting action, here, we mostly focus on Ninjak’s detective skills to find out what’s going on. I like to see this type of action hero show he’s just as much brains as brawn, so that’s a net positive for this issue.
The plot is fairly straightforward. Neville Alcott points Ninjak to a secret research facility with a (very loose) connection to the Daybreak data leak. What makes the plot stand out is an unusual bit of science fiction to explain the nature of the facility and its dreadful experiments. The concept is fantastical but explained well enough to seem plausible.
Let’s talk about the art.
I’ve been clear in prior reviews that Pulido is not a bad artist, but his art style is not a good fit for this type of material. However, I have, as the kids say, cracked the code around what Pulido is doing. The more you look at it through a different lens, the more it makes sense.
Pulido is not drawing an action comic. Pulido is drawing a comic version of an 8-bit, side-scroller video game, specifically the original Castlevania (1986). That’s why character movements are stiff, lacking in any fluidity or energy. You can’t see the movement or the effects or hear the music, so it’s as if somebody was simply retracing pictures from screencaps of a 35-year-old videogame, and the result is as captivating as you might expect.
Therefore, if you’re a fan of 8-bit, side-scroller video games and you’re okay with reading this series as “Ninjak: The Video Game (’80s Edition)”, this realization helps. It helps a lot.
In total, the story’s pretty good with interesting sci-fi elements, and a lightning bolt of realization about the art makes it feel a little less unwelcome.
What’s It About?
[SPOILERS AHEAD – Click here if you just want the score without spoilers]
Before you beat the sub-boss and move on to the next level, read our NINJAK #2 review to find out how the story got to this savepoint.
We begin where the last issue left off. Ninjak and Myna are flying in a small prop plane toward the estate for former MI6 head, Neville Alcott. The estate is already under assault by an assortment of paramilitary groups, so Ninja swoops in to save the day.
The action sequence (the only one in this issue) is rather ridiculous. A small prop plane swoops down with Ninjak twirling on a rope. None of the soldiers react to the plane, which should be heard coming from miles away, or start shooting at Ninjak. He simply swings down and takes them all out. Back to the explanation in the prior section, if you treat this as a tense, exciting, thrilling action comic, this scene is a mess. Buuuut… if you treat it as an NPC fight in an outdated video game, it works PERFECTLY.
Ninjak and Myna land the plane, enter the estate and find Neville in his secret command room. Neville tells them about the siblings who invaded his mind to get the passcodes to MI6 personnel files, AND he recalls that the prober spent a large amount of time on memory about a base MI6 was surveilling before it blew up.
Ninjak and Myna head to the base to sift through the wreckage. They find something previous MI6 investigators missed. We conclude the issue with an imaginative (and gross) retelling of the psychic siblings’ origins and a clue about what’s happening next.
Final Thoughts
NINJAK #3 takes the trope of the spy list released to the public and adds in some unexpected-yet-welcome science fiction to raise the threat level on this uneven series. The art is still a bizarre mismatch for the source material as a traditional comic, but it makes for a more enjoyable read when viewed through the lens of an old video game.
Score: 7.5/10
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