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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Not as Good as Vol 1, but Still Very Very Good!, 14 April 2006
Like the first brilliant volume in the series, this installment will appeal to fans of both Victorian genre literature and modern comics. While it doesn't quite reach the heights of Volume 1, it's still an entertaining concept with a decent story and great art. Following a rather bizarre opening battle scene on Mars (featuring John Carter of Mars and Gulliver), Moore's public-domain "heroes" of the 19th-century British Secret Service (Ms. Murray, the widowed wife of Mr. Harker from Dracula, gaunt ex-adventurer Allan Quartermain, Captain Nemo, the terrifying Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Hawley Griffin, aka The Invisible Man) are assembled to investigate mysterious meteors which have struck outside of London.
These meteors turn out to be invaders from Mars, and a "War of the Worlds" plotline unfolds, as the tripod aliens start incinerating everyone with their death rays and march on a steampunky Victorian London. As in the first volume, much of the storytelling revolves around the characters' relationships with one another, and here we're treated to a dreadful betrayal, a rather shocking (and graphically gross) affair, vengeance, and sacrifice. It's wonderfully written and the visual attention to detail is outstanding -- both story and art are packed with 19th-century literary inside jokes that will reward repeated reading. Especially prominent is the no longer isle-bound Dr. Moreau and his creations, who live sequestered in a British forest.
The artwork is once again pitch perfect throughout, with straightforward paneling jam-packed with detail. For example, a nice piece of dark character-based humor is found in the background of one early panel. The heroes survey the landscape just after a host of innocent citizens have been burned to cinders by the aliens, and while some talk in the foreground, Hawley Griffin is nonchalantly lighting a cigarette from a burning branch. For the Dr. Moreau part, the art is flatter and much more vividly colored, reminiscent of an old-fashioned children's book, albeit one with a good measure of weirdness.
The book comes with plenty of extras, including an amusing "Chutes and Ladders" type game, a lengthy gazetteer of lost worlds, original cover art, and other such tidbits. On the whole, while not quite as amazing as Volume I, this is still much much better than most stuff on the market, both in terms of writing and artwork. A word of caution, the book is not intended for young children. The violence can be rather graphic and there is graphic sexual material.
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