The Amory Wars: Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV

Story: Claudio Sanchez
Writer: Chondra Echert
Artist: Rags Morales
Colorist: Emilio Lopez
Letterer: Ed Dukeshire
Publisher: Boom! Studios and Evil Ink

This entire series has been a great retelling of the Good Apollo story line because it is able to separate events and explanations into issues, so everything becomes much more detailed. Because of that, we are able to become immersed in this world that Claudio Sanchez has created more than we were when we just had the original graphic novel, which I really enjoyed when I first read it all those years ago. Sanchez himself has said that there was a lot lost in that graphic novel, so I was very excited to learn we were getting a whole series that would retell this story.

Now issues #1-9 have been really fun and intricate so far. Some issues were more dialogue, with detailed explanations of history and such, while some issues were exciting and adventurous. All in all, I have loved this series since issue #1. Now we have #10, and it is one of my favorite comic book issues that I have read in awhile. The nine issues leading up to this point have been the absolute perfect build up needed for this exciting issue, and #10 delivers the first part of an incredible climax of the story.

Let me start with explaining how much I loved the artwork in this issue. The issue opens with us seeing the Vishual, which Rags Morales and Emilio Lopez made look amazing with the color scheme. The characters all look detailed and great as usual, but now we see all of the characters, an undead army, and a lot of bad guys battle it out in a brutal war. Morales’ depiction of this war are exactly what this series needed. Up until this point, this series has been dramatic, beautiful, and complicated. Throughout the majority of this book, at the sight of the artwork alone, which has little dialogue, we experience a lot of drama, a lot of beauty, a lot of excitement, and still leaves us with questions and anticipation for where the story goes next. On top of all of that, the cover is stunning and really is an indication for the amazing artwork inside the issue.

Chondra Echert along with Sanchez has done an amazing job with this series because she took a complicated story with an even more complicated past and broke it down for us without making it boring. I love how much I’ve grown to understand the Amory Wars’ history through Echert’s writing because it gives me a whole new appreciation for the story and makes me feel much more invested in it. Now this issue does not have much dialogue at all, but the story is amazing and full of action, and we see the characters in a very important part of all of this. This important event comes at such a perfect time in this twelve part series, and now we get to see what this means for them in the next two issues.

I know that I spent this whole review gushing about how much I love the series and this issue especially, but I honestly think it is worthy of all of that praise. What makes it so good is that it has captured such a classic comic book experience. The dialogue, the intricate storyline with it’s deep history, the artwork, and the action all come together to make such a solid issue of a comic book series. It feels classic while still feeling fresh, which could not have been an easy job for this incredible team. If you are reading this review and have not read up until this point, you are missing out, because this issue is so great that it is absolutely worth catching up to.