Oblivion Song #1
There is a saying that goes, “Every ending is a new beginning.” That is most certainly the case with Robert Kirkman’s Invincible series ending in February and his new Oblivion Song beginning in March. Artist Lorenzo De Felici is a newcomer, who has mainly done some covers for series, including The Walking Dead and Invincible. The first part of the book throws the reader straight into the world of Oblivion, an apocalyptic world with giant mutant monsters that eat people.
The issue does a good job of not letting the cat out of the bag just yet and peaking the reader’s interest in just what the hell is going on. It’s not long, though, before it becomes clear that there are two worlds, or dimensions, in this story. The opening scene was a rescue mission to recover people lost after an event that occured in a modern day city a decade ago. The main character, Nathan Cole, lost a brother in the occurrence and has been searching for him ever since by doing dimensional jumps to Oblivion on his own. He has hopes that, with his recent rescue of a married couple, funding will be reinstated for the rescue program, thus increasing efforts to find all those lost.
Of course this isn’t the case and the powers that be see it as a waste of money, resources, and it’s best to let those lost go to let families have closure. They also don’t want to push their luck and have another event occur by continuing to do dimension jumps
Nathan isn’t ready to quit, though, and will continue on his mission of searching Oblivion and hoping he finds his brother one day. His chances look grim, though, without receiving funding to replace failing tech and building a team to aid him in search and rescue attempts. Nathan returns to Oblivion and finds a corpse, which he takes a dental imprint of so it can be identified later. The reader catches a glimpse of where the series could be heading in the closing pages. It seems that those lost in Oblivion have been watching Nathan for some time now. The couple he rescued at the beginning of the issue was involved in their own mission, it seems, with Nathan being the target. It ends with two men watching Nathan from a far, one discussing with the other how it is time to set a trap so they can find out about this mysterious person who has been appearing and disappearing in Oblivion for years now. One of those men being the long lost brother, Nathan has been so diligently searching for all these years.
Kirkman’s writing on the series didn’t disappoint. He has come up with a fresh concept for a new series that looks to be very promising and full of excitement, just as he has done in the past with The Walking Dead and the recently ended Invincible series. It would have been great to have Ryan Ottley on this book because, to be honest, this is the type of stuff that is right up his alley. Nevertheless, Lorenzo De Felici does a good job. He just doesn’t have much work out there other than doing some covers, as mentioned earlier. He still did a great job capturing the essence of the story with his art and was able to set the tone of the moments that Kirkman wrote for the readers very well. Feelings of fear, despair, and frustration are seen clearly in De Felici’s panels. This is a series to keep on the radar and looks to be promising. It has some big shoes to fill, coming in behind Invincible ending, so only time will tell how its success will compare to Kirkman’s other great work. Check out issue #2 out April 11th, 2018 to see what happens next.
