Product Description

There's nothing like going back to the beginning and reading it all over again. See how the Witchblade chose Sara and threw her into the chaotic world of the supernatural. Get the first appearances of Sara Pezzini, Ian Nottingham, Kenneth Irons and Jackie Estacado in one handy tome!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #115074 in Books
• Published on: 2006-12-20
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 1248 pages

Customer Reviews

Hard Work!
There's no denying that the core concept of Witchblade is a strong one - a mystical gauntlet handed down through the ages that bonds symbiotically with its wearer. The realisation and execution of Witchblade has been something else entirely though.

Launched during the Image Comics/ Superstar artist boom of the 1990s, Withcblade bears all the trappings one would expect: lots of splash pages, jutting breasts,butts and women in sexy poses even when they've no need to be! However, there is an attempt to prove that Witchblade has more substance to it by making its lead Sara Pezzini a homicide dectective in the NYPD.

Sadly, the title is quite badly written. Or more to the point, over written. i think this is to try and sell the title as a serious proposition, but it doesn't quite come off. Between them Christina Z and David Wohl litter the title with endless florid internal monologue panels which shed relatively little insight into the unfolding drama. The dialogue is quite flabby, wooden and expository too. The worst excesses of this are typically given to supposed villain Kenneth Irons, whose attempts at mystery generally run along the lines of 'Sara my dear the Witchblade is older and more powerful than you can possibly imagine. I have coverted its power for many years and I will stop at nothing to possess it and control you. But my dear Sara, the chase shall not be so easy. I am more rich and powerful than you can imaginwe. Let me take you to dinner, Sara. There I will show you my wealth and power. And then you will be mine.' etc etc.

Equally confusing is the role of Irons' bodyguard in all this, who ends up possessing the Witchblade for no particular reason and then kills his secret mistress (who's introduced and bumped off in about five issues) and well, thats it really. Plot strands come and go with no real resolution. For instance, the character of Nikki is introduced as a homeless street kid. Sara's supposed to look after her. She doesn't, Nikki ends up embroiled in some dubious modelling agency and is rescued from it and then pretty much forgotten about until the writers remember they've just left her in limbo.There's even an amusing panel of Sara actually saying that she'd completely forgotten about her! The whole thing is very much like the tacky US daytime show The Bold & The Beautiful,with supernatural trappings.

Having muddled through the first forty issues of largely forgettable tales in which we learn that Sara finds the Witchblade difficult to control, Ken Irons is essentially Blofeld funnelled through a badly dubbed anime, Ian Nottingham broods,Sara's partner Jake says "dammit!" and that Sara has a sister. Its all a bit disappointing, because somewhere under all this is a good comic trying to get out.

Things take a turn for the better when Paul Jenkins jumps on board, although his initial two part story perhaps tells you that he's not taking things terribly seriously: A comical partner, no reference to previous events and a big old explosion that takes out half the city which is forgotten about in the following issues! The presence of Rick Veitch, a serious crime writer, ensures that the following serial killer arc has a lot more meat to it in terms of charactersiation, plotting and structure. The vastly improved art by Keu Cha also helps. Showing that there is much promise for the future of the title.

Overall, I can't rate it higher than two stars owing to a sizable chunk of the collection being underwhelming. Even Michael Turner's art is on and off, with some characters' anatomy being incredibly questionable, to say the least. In terms of value for money, its a no brainer, collecting the first fifty issues and worth it if you fancy delving into Witchblade's somewhat uneven past. For newbies (like me), stick with the current Ron Marz stuff. You wont be missing anything by not reading this.

A Review and a disagreement...
To start and get the harder thing out of the way... the Previous Reviewer, Simon Hall, has clearly not read many Comic Books from the the Mid-to-late '90s as he would know that Sexy Poses and enormous busts for the principal characters (in Comics and Games) is a regular appearance, X-Men, Lara Croft, and various others...

and if the storys were so terrible why did WITCHBLADE become a hit, and here is the reason, the character - despite bust size and her sensuality, was a new york cop, Not a Mutant, or a Kryptonian, but a flesh and blood human with real life problems... which for me makes the book worth reading as she isn't running around in spandex (Alright She appears in Hooker attire near the beginning of Issue 1... then it was to catch a Purp)

Also The Writing is not that terrible, if seen worse in a Uwe Boll Movie...

Please Learn Something about when the source material comes from as it's the only way you can really understand - and Simon - this is book is for the people who have recently read witchblade and want to start from the beggining and i am enjoying every page.

Though i Agree with Simon on two things - Ian Nottingham's Story Arc through the Compendium is Confused, and Ken Irons is a bit contrived as a Villian.

But All In All I'd Recommend this to anyone who is a "true" WITCHBLADE fan and am pleased with what Marc Silvestri and Top Cow Achieved with their Flagship Title...