Advance Review: `Swan Songs’ #1 Finds The Beauty In Endings
by Tom Smithyman
Overview
For a series about endings, Swan Songs has a fantastic beginning. The art, which features the runup to a nuclear holocaust, is strangely beautiful. And the writing is top notch focusing on a mother-son relationship instead of the end of the world.
Overall
10/10The end of the world never looked so beautiful.
In artist Martin Simmonds hands, even a dying mother and a nuclear holocaust can be works of art. From the first page featuring a riot outside of a skyscraper, Simmonds pulls the readers. Along the way, through haunting imagery and expressive colors, he forces his audience to pay attention to the story. We may not have long to spend with the characters in this anthology series, but we care about them – largely thanks to Simmonds.
That is not a knock on writer W. Maxwell Prince’s script. Quite the contrary. His writing is sharp as ever, and very much in line with what fans of his Ice Cream Man series come to expect. The stories – this initial one anyway – are dark and foreboding. And yet it is essentially human at its core.
In this premiere issue, Brian’s mom is dying. Unfortunately, so is society. Cities are aflame and so-called emotional vampires are running around as the atomic clock ticks down to zero. But Brian is on a mission. He has one more magazine to read to his mother, then he will have completed the series. But getting the periodical involves a harrowing trip across town. But, as he says, he’ll do anything for his mom. Especially if it’s the last thing either of them remember.
It’s a fantastic start to this new series about endings. And it doesn’t hurt that the creative team is dealing with the biggest ending of all – that of the human race. But the end of the world is really a background story to showcase Brian’s love and dedication to his mom. Sure, his therapist tells him that the relationship isn’t a healthy one, but it’s his mom. It’s easy for most people to relate to what Brian is going through. In a world where is has little power over anything, he wants to be able to control this last act of love.
Prince will continue to write the chapters in the series, bringing in a new artist for each issue. Future issues will deal with the end of a marriage and the end of a sentence and be drawn by artists including Caspar Wijngaard and Filipe Andrade. If they are anything like this dynamite first issue, Prince will have another hit on his hands.
Swan Songs #1 will be available for purchase on July 5, 2023.
