Celebrating Image Comics Birthday – ‘Age of Bronze’ Brings The Trojan War To Comics Life
by Austin Gorton
To say that superhero comics are akin to modern mythology is, at this point, so cliché it’s become more laughable than apt. Yet at the same time, I can’t deny that, for me, the path from Greek and Roman mythology to superheroes is a fairly direct one. I read voraciously as a child, and one of books that was never far from reach was my dad’s tattered old paperback copy of Edith Hamilton‘s Mythology. Repeated readings burned its stories of ancient gods and men into my psyche, with the events of the Trojan War a particular favorite.
Not long after Hamilton’s Mythology had completely imprinted itself on me, I got into superhero comics, and the same kinds of things that drew me to the tales of the Greek gods kept me hooked on comics: larger-than-life characters, great feats of strength, the folly of hubris, the tragedy of destiny and simplistic but archetypal themes and metaphors. But perhaps no comic book represents the link between the two quite like writer/artist Eric Shanower‘s Age of Bronze, my favorite Image series.
Setting out with no less a mission than to tell the complete story of the Trojan War in comic book form, Age of Bronze is a masterclass in research and adaptation. Far more than a comic book retelling of Homer’s Illiad, Shanower sources his text from multiple mythological, historical, and anthropological sources and narratives and distills them down into an engaging narrative.
Originally published in black-and-white, his linework is clean and expressive, successfully carrying the burden of making a cast of character with similar clothes and hairstyles visually distinct, from the sneering Paris to the proud Agamemnon to the vain Achilles. Each issue is stuff to the gills with extras, including pronunciations guides to the character names and thorough annotations of the source material inspiring each given issue (and if there’s anything I love more than fantastic stories, it’s writings ABOUT fantastic stories).
Shanower also displays a phenomenal knack for pacing throughout the series, not just synthesizing all the various source material into one ur-narrative, but also recognizing how to break that narrative up into distinct arcs, and then to break those arcs up into discrete issue-long chapters. Yet at the same time, his ability to parse the grand, sweeping epic of the Trojan War into a serial narrative likely led to the downfall of the series.
While not officially dead, as far as I know, it’s been many years since a new issue was released, even as colorized collections of the series have been released. And despite publishing thirty-three issues in total, the narrative hasn’t even gotten close to where The Illiad starts up.
Each issue must understandably represent a huge effort when one person is doing all the research, writing, and drawing. Hopefully, Shanower will find a way to keep it going in some form, and complete the mission of crafting a complete comic book telling of the Trojan War.
Yet even if he doesn’t, Age of Bronze will stand as my favorite Image series, and as a great example of what the publisher does best as we celebrate their birthday: let creators with specific visions and styles cook, even if the end result is an extremely niche-y retelling of one of Western Civilization’s foundational narratives.
