Lake of Fire #1

Written By Nathan Fairbairn

Art by Matt Smith

Published by Image Comics

Now is the time to capitalize on the popularity of Templars. They’re everywhere and seem capable of battling anything. The Assassin’s Creed franchise has slowly begun showing them in a more ambiguous and interesting light. James Purefoy donned the red cross for a Seven Samurai remake called Ironclad. Short film director James Bushe pitted a templar against the galaxy’s most famous hunter in his fan film Predator: Dark Ages. “Knight of the Cross” Michael Carpenter battles the forces of evil in the Dresden Files. Even with their current ubiquity, the Knights Templar haven’t worn out their welcome and it doesn’t look like Like of Fire is where their popularity will start fading. It’s a lot of fun.

The story begins with a traditional ragtag group of rejects that invariably populate stories like this. The unmerry band consists of the typical archetypes: a battle-hardened drunk, an over-zealous young knight, a well-respected nobleman who has to look out for said young knight, and the smarter young man who will probably live longer than most. But this comic ups the potential for internal conflict by including a grand inquisitor who sees heresy everywhere his eyes wander.

The lord overseeing an important siege decided he’d rather not have his camp saddled with these disruptive rogues and cast the group off to the remote pyrenees to hunt for rumored heretics. No one takes the assignment seriously until the group runs into murderous alien monsters.

It makes sense to have aliens visit our little planet at some point in the past. It’s not like civilizations thousands or tens of thousands of years beyond our capabilities would wait until present day to do a fly by. Although, this horde of aliens seems like mindless killing machines that’s incapable of doing much except...killing.  Like in Alien, the horde is probably what forced the spacecraft to crash into the planet.

So far, the best parts of Lake of Fire are the conversations between the characters. No one is happy about their role in this story. No one. They have all drawn different lots in life and exist at different junctures on their path to the grave. Every conversation has the potential for argument. Besides the typical macho posturing about their self-importance, they sometimes argue about interesting things like religion or war. And they chop up aliens with swords. It’s the best of both worlds. Fairbairn has a good eye for balancing fun with characterization and Matt Smith's art is clean and effective.

People should definitely read this.