“Dark Engine” #4 is the most foreshadowing issue yet. It begins, as each issue does, with The Dragon’s journey towards the Gigahul he intends to pilot. After a close call with a terrible flying beast, 2 things are revealed, one that The dragon is in a life-or-death time crunch, and two that he is heading directly for the Alchemist’s tower. Meanwhile Sym is doing what Sym does, which turns out to be blindingly macabre at this point, and the alchemists are having some internal issues; the skull crushing kind. “Dark Engine” is concludes its first arc and is a book every fantasy fan should be reading.
WRITTEN BY: Ryan Burton
ART BY: John Bivens
PUBLISHER: Image Comics
PRICE: $3.50
RELEASE: November 26, 2014
Reviewed By Eric Switzer
I feel like I am on top of the language of “Dark Engine”, and in only four issues I actually pretty impressed. I read Prophet for years and never figured out what was going on. I called it Dune-syndrome, and as I’ve said before, I was at first afraid this book suffered from it, but now I realize the slight learning curve has an incredible reward.
There are at least two more incredible reveals in this issue that I wouldn’t dare spoil because it gives this series such great depth and new energy. I was at once shocked and embarrassed that I didn’t pick up on it before hand, but this isn’t a book you can make assumptions about. To enjoy “Dark Engine” you really have to submit Burton and Bivens and enjoy the ride they are taking you on. Not every twist and turn will blow your mind, but it is consistently weird and fantastic and disgusting and beautiful. This is the action/horror/hard-sci-fi you’ve been waiting for.
I said about the last issue that it didn’t suffer from the crowded panels and incomprehensible action that the first two issues did, but a couple of times in this issue I paused to speculate what I was looking at. It isn’t particularly uncommon, but it does always seem to take me out the action.
This is a spectacular finale to the first arc and one that intrigues as much as it confounds. I highly recommend “Dark Engine”. It takes a few issues to get a handle on the world, but once you figure it out, you won’t be ddisappointed
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Eric Switzer is an aspiring filmmaker and screenplay writer living in Los Angeles. His work tends to focus on the lighter side of entropy, dystopic futures, and man’s innate struggle with his own mortality. He can be found on twitter @epicswitzer or reached via email at ericswitzerfilm@gmail.com.