Comic Break: Northlanders #11 (Vertigo)

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Northlanders
Issue: #11
Writer: Brian Wood
Artist: Ryan Kelly
32 pp. Vertigo. $2.99

Reviewed by Paul Stotts

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“I know they were bad dogs. You had to kill them. Right?” — Northlanders #11

This is the first issue of the Vertigo published series Northlanders that I’ve read, the current issue marking the beginning of a new six-part story arc called The Cross + The Hammer. If this is indicative of the entire series, this is also the last issue of Northlanders I will read (an action which elicits no tears from me). Silly, pedestrian and highly unoriginal, the issue reads like a bad movie screenplay. Set in Ireland in 1014 A.D., the issue is one part Conan the Barbarian, one part CSI and one part The Fugitive. Unfortunately, all of these parts together are vastly uninteresting.

Writer Brian Wood’s script is vastly problematic. The dialogue in spots is clichéd, anachronistic or downright laughable. Ragnar Ragnarsson, who spends the issue tracking the fleeing Magnus, at one point refers to the Magnus as a “perp.” This anachronism is jarring to the story. This is a general problem with the dialogue as it is too modern and unbelievable for the era. Ragnar even mentions taking a forensic science class at the local college, before referring to “half-bags” and “splatter patterns” at the crime scene he is investigating. However, this doesn’t stop him from tasting a spot of blood from the area. What exactly does one need to taste blood for? To see how fresh it is? It’s incongruous that someone talking about splatter patterns would taste blood at a crime scene. (Surprisingly, Ragnar failed to talk about the blood’s viscosity.) Not to mention the setting is Ireland in 1014 A.D.

To compound matters, the characters are cardboard cutouts, stereotypical, flat and generally uninteresting. You have your grunting, monosyllabic hero Magnus, his wide-eyed, innocent daughter Brigid and the aforementioned blood-tasting Ragnar. Wood offers the reader nothing that would make us want to learn more about the characters. I felt absolutely no connection to any of the characters, nor did I feel invested in their plight. When Magnus and Brigid are confronted by a pack of slavering hounds, whether they survived was completely unimportant to me. This drained any potential tension out of the story. Even the hideous wound that Magnus has on his sword arm (his arm looks like it’s about to separate from his shoulder), lends no tension to his struggle. In fact, his arm appears perfectly fine considering he has no trouble wielding his sword during an extensive battle with the hounds. Only a few panels previous to the fight, Magnus was cradling his arm protectively. It seems he heals quite fast.

The artwork in the issue is solid, though fairly basic. I’m not a big fan of the cartoony-looking style artist Ryan Wood uses for the issue. It’s adequate to the tone of the story, but something darker and grittier would have worked better here. Still, the main problems with this issue of Northlanders are beyond Wood’s control. From the beginning, he’s saddled with a terrible script.

Ultimately, this issue is a forgettable mess, possessing nothing even slightly redeeming. Like the bad dogs hounding Magnus in the story, this issue of Northlanders should have been brutally put down.

Final Grade: 43 out of 100