Vampires… they probably the most overdone concept right next to zombies and superheroes. Does Mark Millar stick the landing with his new vampire comic “Vatican City”, or does it kick my ass into wanting to read something else? Let’s chat.
First, if you don’t know Mark Millar, he’s known for writing Kick-Ass, Marvel Civil War, Super Crooks, Old Man Logan, Jupiter’s Legacy, Nemesis, and a lot more comics. I’m a fan of Mr. Millar. He’s written a handful of my favorite comics, like Kick-Ass.
I also want to mention that I was kindly given an early review copy from Mr. Millar himself and am extremely grateful that he was kind enough to give a review copy to a new reviewer without an audience… thank you. That is rarely done… with that being said, I don’t know if it’s a stand out amongst what I’ve read this year so far.
I had to go back and read kick-ass #1 to understand my gut reaction and gripes about this story, but before I tell you about that, let me tell you what Vatican City is about so far. From what I perceived, Vatican City #1 lays the groundwork for the story to come. First, what's it about? Well Vatican City is about a group of vampires doing their best to take over Vatican City after they took over the world. They'll find it a bit tricky because they can't get on holy ground. The humans are worried because all the guards for the Vatican City are gone. Their only hope is our main character, Guido a potential Swiss army recruit. He must step up and rally the people in the City to fight against the vampires and stop them from their plan.
Let’s start with the positives then I have some critiques. I think it has the potential to be a very fun and interesting story. You get vampires, blood, and action, which a lot of people love, including myself. The main character is interesting enough. Even though we don’t spend a lot of time with him before the action starts, we see that he’s a natural leader and jumps into action when others don’t. Also, he just carries around a yo-yo with him, and anyone who does that in my book… is a cool guy. … I’m really hoping to see the yo-yo come back and be super important in some way later. If it’s not, I will be disappointed. Those are the positives! A bit short in comparison to my…
Critiques:
The art. Let’s start with the art. Now it might be because I read it digitally, but I just don’t vibe with the art direction. I see what they are going for, but it just didn’t hit my eyes in a fun way. It still looks like it’s a sketch or a concept of what the art should look like, and It’s not something I would necessarily hang up on my wall. That being said, it does its job of good composition and delivering the visual information that we need. (NOTE: it does look better when I zoom out on my digital copy, so I’m looking forward to seeing what the physical copy looks like)
The lettering. To me is a bit unappealing. The balloons blend in with the art style which made them fade into the background instead of pop out, and then the digital text just contrasts too poorly with the comic and doesn’t compliment the art direction at all. And we often see the dialogue text is too cramped and hard to read.
The writing. It’s OK! The first issue is very fast-paced to get us to the end, and the reveal of the mission of the vampires which is fast-paced is fine… but that fast pace mixed with the scope of the story sacrifices a deeper connection with the main character or the world. Like I don’t know if everyone already knew vampires existed in this world or not because the main character kind of brought it out without very much context and everyone quickly accepted it. Personally, from a character standpoint, I wish we got to see everything he info dumped in his introduction while we watched the carnage unfold around him. for example, Off the top of my head, it could’ve been done through news and conversations. Flashbacks/Forwards.
Now, this character thing might just be a personal critique, and I’m not accounting for the next issues where we can learn more about the character. Just for a comparison, I really enjoyed the way he built up Dave in Kick-Ass’ first issue. It established the world, the character, and the tone in the same amount of time as this one. And by the end of Kick-Ass, it made me want to keep reading right away because I didn’t necessarily know where it was going and was excited by that. Vatican City, on the other hand, I kind of know the story that’s coming at me. They are going to fight the vampires and try to stop them. Which is fine, but the ending just didn’t hit the same.
A note expanding on this Kick-Ass comparison is: where Kick-Ass felt like an indie movie, Vatican City feels like a Netflix original movie. There was just more heart and passion thrown into Kick-Ass that radiated off the page. Where Vatican City #1 just felt like the beginning of a blockbuster. Neither approach is wrong for entertainment purposes as there is a place for indie movies and blockbusters, it just isn’t exactly what I wanted or expected.
I’m still going to pick up the next issue to see where it goes because it’s not a bad story by any means, it just didn’t hook me in the way that Kick-Ass did. It’s probably not fair to compare best works, but it’s impossible to not compare when such a high bar was set.
My final rating is: Check out issue one. If you like it, add it to your pull list. If not grab the trade paperback when it comes out. Did you read Vatican City #1? Are you excited about it let me know in the comments. Click that video on the screen to watch more of my reviews. Okay, bye now!
AND HEYY! If you’re into indie comics and creator-owned stories, check out the comics I write over at Heyy Comics. I’m Elijah Joseph, comic creator and founder of Panel Junkies.
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