Prophet #25

Written by Brandon Graham with Giannis Milonogiannis and Simon Roy, and Frank Teran
Art by Giannis Milonogiannis and Frank Teran

Prophet continues to be one of the most creative and original comics on the stand, but I am happy to see that this issue ends in such a way as to suggest that something different is going to begin happening sometime soon.

Since the series was relaunched (after being abandoned for some fifteen years), it's been hard to predict.  The first three issues involved John Prophet reawakening on Earth after thousands of years of change, with a mission he had to complete.  Then, there was a done-in-one issue that involved a different, tailed, John Prophet waking up on a spaceship, having to complete a mission.

Now, with this issue, three different Johns (none named Prophet) are on an alien world, hunting a living tool-creature (it's not all that clear).  The story is very similar to last month's except now there's more than one protagonist, and an ending that does lead me to believe that this series will acknowledge it's god-awful roots in the 90s.  Brandon Graham (and his collaborators) continue to write this book in a Heavy Metal style, which is sometimes confusing, but also gripping.

This issue's artist, Giannis Milonogiannis, is new to me, but he's the perfect choice if the intent was to find someone who can bridge and blend the previous artists Simon Roy and Farel Dalrymple's styles. Frank Teran's back-up series Initiate continues, and it's interesting and pretty, even if not a whole lot makes sense.

I feel like it's time for Graham to start tightening up his plans for this series, but I am enjoying this series a great deal.

Prophet #23

Written by Brandon Graham, Simon Roy, and Frank Teran
Art by Simon Roy and Frank Teran

For the third straight month in a row, Prophet blows me away with its high degree of creativity and terrific artwork.

Since the book began, in issue 21 (I refuse to even acknowledge the earlier issues), we as readers have been given very little information to help us understand what is going on in this comic.  We know that John Prophet has awoken in a far-off future, after human civilization has disappeared from the Earth, and instead various groups of aliens or strangely-evolved creatures have taken charge, in a scattered patchwork of settlements and colonies.

This month, after twenty-four days of travel, John arrives at the sight of his mission.  To complete it, he must scale the Tower of Thauilu Vah, and get onto the GOD satellite.  To do this, he has to go through or around a variety of strange creatures, and deal with the Xiux-Guin Blade, a creature that has been tracking him since the last issue.

Once again, every page drips with new and unique ideas.  Graham gives us crystal-blessed aliens, living missiles, and living adaptive clothing.  Prophet's world is exceedingly strange, and Simon Roy is more than up to the job of portraying it, in all its glory.  His work on this book has been remarkable, bringing to mind some of the most Surrealistic of Moebius's stories, while still making perfect sense within the logic of Graham's tale.

This issue also features the beginning of a back-up called Initiate by Frank Teran.  There's not enough here to have a clear sense of what this is going to be about, but it is very pretty.