Portrait Of A Saviour As A Young Boy – Reviewing ‘Second Coming: Trinity’ #3
by Olly MacNamee
Summary
‘Second Coming: Trinity’ #3 gives us a story from Jesus’s childhood in which the young saviour to be comes off as something a good deal more than just another local neighbourhood rascal. In fact, his reckless actions would make Dennis the Menace blush. Another issue that perfectly balances the profound with the humorous from Mark Russell, Richard Pace and Leonard Kirk.
Overall
10/10Now, I’m no theologian but even I know there isn’t too much coverage of Jesus’s childhood covered in The Bible. And so writer Mark Russell seized on this oversight by filling the vacuum with his own depiction of the Christ child in Second Coming: Trinity #3. And in doing so produces one of the most profound issues of the whole three-series run.
Jesus, like so many boys growing up, is something of a tearaway. But, in his case, he has God-like powers that make him much more that the local neighbourhood terror; he becomes a figure to fear using his powers without any responsibility whatsoever. Seems Peter Parker was not the first to learn that with great power… Well, you know the rest.
Of course, what occurs in the past is reflected in the present and in Sunstar, himself something of a child in a world full of them. It almost reads as a parable itself, and another lesson that even some two thousand years later the human – and superhuman – race is still learning. As well as Jesus’s dad.
As well as the insightful lessons dressed up as a superhero parody, I cannot praise the art partnership of Richard Pace (on layouts) and Leonard Kirk (on finishes) enough. Kirk’s economy of line beautifully convey each beat of this issue’s inspiring narrative seemingly with ease. But, take a closer look and you’ll see both a highly realised contemporary world but also a homely depiction of the Biblical past too, with many characters undergoing a whole gamut of emotions captured perfectly by the two artists. The warm climes of the Middle East of the past radiating off the page courtesy of colourist Andy Troy.
Second Coming: Trinity continues to be one of the more intelligent and funny books on the shelves, which is no mean feat to pull off, especially this consistently. Unlike a preacher in a pulpit on a Sunday morning, or Rabbi at Synagogue on a Saturday, or even an Imam in Mosque on Friday, this series never preaches. Instead, it not only delivers messages of hope in the figure of Jesus, a man who just won’t give up now he has found his calling once again, but in Sunstar we have a character that may have started off as yet another Superman cypher, but is developing into his own individual character too with the kind of real-world problems Supes never seems to have.
Second Coming: Trinity #3 is a warm, witty parable for the modern age and out now from AHOY Comics.
