Prince of Heroes Highly recommended

Publisher
Antarctic Press
Writer
Rod Espinosa
Artist
Rod Espinosa
Country of origin
US
Year
2007

Prince of Heroes #3 of 3

By David Rasmussen
7th Jun 08

Do you like Espinosa’s work? Who doesn’t.
Do you like him? Really really really really like him?
Do you like him to the point you will follow one title of his for this 3 issue miniseries, the first chapter of a 18 CHAPTER LONG STORY!! Now… think you can hold your breath to wait to see WHEN the start of the next Chapter is? Do you?

If the end of the first Chapter has any flaws it is that Espinosa is being rather… hmm… how to put it… “coy”… yeah, “Coy” about when the next Chapter (Chapter 2) will hit. He has already hinted what will be in that Chapter, but let’s save that for the end of the review. Right now, let’s wrap Chapter 1.

As Issue #1 starts we come to a desert planet to witness a strange caravan of what seems to be anamorphic hyena people riding zebras escorting a party of travellers towards a destination. It’s not a happy trip though.

Oh, meet Ronen (the Prince of this title). Young, brave, strong, fearless… only he’s not feeling it right now. He just wanted the simple life (no, not that Simple Life, nobody wants that) but now he knows he will never have that. His mom said he’s destined for greatness, and his true heritage lies at the edge of the known universe. So he’s going to take the first step, but getting the hell off the planet he’s on as he and his mom (and their people) are being shown the exit by the not so pleased natives.

It seems for a Prince who will become the Prince of Heroes his blood 0his homies, his people, the other humanoids in his culture circle) kinda pissed off people when they had this whole “Great Expansion” thing and ended up taking a lot of worlds for thousands of years. Well, now they’re going back to their own original “Empire” size doing a galactic version of The Biggest Loser (and they’ll be far happier once that extra weight has been shed) which means the Prince is headed away from this place. That is where we pick up in this issue, by the way, the departure scene.

But prior to this we got abit of backstory before we got to the teary leaving scene, so you have some context into why the leaving is so sad in this issue.

The Prince is going to the local marketplace where he defends the locals from a bunch of thugs led by this Duke joker. Well, he manages to trounce them rather well, only for a strange staff wielding woman to interfere just as he has beaten the bullies. Issue #1 ends and we roll into Issue #2.

Turns out the woman is the Baroness Mazza Mezzo (or, as I’d like to call her, “thug enabler”). Look, lady, just because you got a shallow end of the gene pool as your brother doesn’t mean you have to take his side and bully the innocent, you meanie you!
A fight ends up breaking out and sister enabler ends up getting harmed really badly.
Yeah. Somebody got her’s… OK, all it does is just strip her down on clothes and… well… makes her really really really mad. Look, like it’s his fault… OK, maybe it was, but still you had it coming to you lady!

So, now wishing he was back to the beginning of Issue #1 and leaving the planet (because right now he should put a few parsecs of space between himself and the crazy psycho woman) he’s on the run. Not good because she’s right behind him in hot pursuit.
Eventually they fight (again). He knocks out the lady’s pissy brother (because he’s off threatening the two kids who are the child stars of this story… again).

He gets the lady ready to hand stuff him into a food processor by doing something I thought was only done in erotica and -- he pulls off her itsy bitsy little bottom clothes and -- yeah -- there will be hell to pa -- lady, your brother’s blushing! What a pervert!!
Somehow the situation ends.

Mostly because she can’t chase him anymore because she’s… bare bottomed.
So that’s it, all’s well that end’s well… in the end… in the…
Sorry. Bad choice of things to fixate on… hmmm…
Where was I…?
Oh, right.

Ronen stops off and see’s… Daredevil? Hmm! This planet doesn’t need no stinkin’ blind lawyers… oh, never mind. Apparently the blind guy (who wears a black scarf over his face with no eyeholes since he’s blind) is his teacher, and they’re talking about Ronen getting a new teacher to teach him (oh, apparently this is a flashback that he’s remembering, which means thankfully as he leaves the planet he’s leaving the crazy now half naked woman behind… behind… I… yeah, stop that.)

Ronen’s all bummed about leaving (which you saw at the start of Issue #1). However leave they must as it seems they are just a hair’s breath from having a run-in with the very people that may be behind this whole Biggest Loser galactic space weight lost program Ronen’s “Empire” is undergoing. In fact, as the issue ends, we see that they are just arriving as they are on their way out.

Issue #3 is the sad departure as he must say goodbye to the two kids he is friends with, his mentor, and the planet he knew for so long. Basically it’s the end of his existence as he knew it before moving on back into the inner domain of his people’s grand “empire” and whatever life has in store for him then (in the next exciting gripping chapter).

So what does life have in store for him? Well, no “Crying Game” secrets here since Espinosa left hints for us at the start of the issue, so let’s see where things continue on from here…

What Prince of heroes Chapter 2 Should Have…
- New characters come into the story such as a “super-multi-bot” (who needs those average bots when you can have a super-multi-bot!!), an ever stranger dolphin in a mech suit (which would be weird if it wasn’t sounding rather like a recycle off of Neotopia… hmm… cross fingers and hope that bot isn’t another recycle off of Neotopia), an insect pilot (as opposed to a bat pilot from Neotopia), and “lots of quirky aliens”… right.

- Returning characters (should press forward to review Battle Girlz since I am sure a few of these “returning” characters are from that series) include “Mighty girl Eevi” (sporting a “cool new monicker”), Ayanama the Spellbinder and The Goddess Sassa Rai.

That’s it for the hints, maybe you can spin over to the official Prince of Heroes website and check it out for any more “hints” or just plain spoilers to what Chapter 2 is going to have (like maybe find out when Chapter 2 releases) by heading over to www.princeofheroes.com for more info (as well as visiting Rod Espinosa’s myspace page with www.myspace.com/rodespinosa).

As for the breakdown it’s what you expect from Espinosa.
All the same high quality artwork, visual splendor, grand scale of story (with generous amounts of the human element that makes his works so damn special) and that bit of whimsy and fun which makes for great reading. It’s all here, and it’s all waiting for you.

Now if we can only get to the next Chapter and see what comes next!
Prince of Heroes Chapter 1, the complete 3 issue set (this review completing the cycle with the review of Issue #3) gets the mark of greatness, as it deserves, as once again Rod Espinosa proves his greatness with another 5 out of 5 review.
Next time, the start of the second Chapter, and Prince of Heroes #… number…
So, what, is this going to be Issue #4 or Chapter 2 Issue #1?!?
Prince of Heroes © & ™ Rod Espinosa

-- David Rasmussen 7th Jun 08