The Mighty Crusaders #1

Story by: Ian Flynn

Art by: Kelsey Shannon

Colors by: Matt Herms

Published by: Dark Circle Comics (Archie Comics)

Archie Comics’ Dark Circle imprint continues (returns) this month with their latest entry into the superhero genre with Mighty Crusaders. For those who may be be unfamiliar with the Crusaders, they are in essence the equivalent in the Archie comicverse to the Justice League of America in DC and The Avengers at Marvel.

Bringing together the pantheon of heroes from the old MLJ Comics - which appears as a fun little easter egg in the issue - we get to be introduced to this new set of heroes in the best way possible: all-out brawl with a two legged dinosaur man! As far as intros go, this is probably the best way to get the ball rolling on a new comic with a larger cast: have a villain to fight, introduce in someway each member of the team and try to showcase their powerset within said battle.

Here, Flynn succeeds quite admirably. It helps that for the rest of the first issue we get to learn a little bit more about each character (both new and old) through the eyes of the new Shield character, as she is talking to the former Shield about her new teammates and how she isn’t sure if they will gel as a team.

The rest of the cast comprises a couple of newer characters that long-time Mighty Crusader fans may not know, some older characters as well some that were introduced when Dark Circle came back into print a few years ago. This, combined with a pretty fun first issue, gives me hope that this will be a pretty fun series to read.