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September 06, 2005
Subway Reading: Shining Knight
Shining Knight #4 - The story doesn't wrap up in this issue so much as it simply ends. There was a major "say wha?!?" plot twist that seemed to fly in from left field, but I would have preferred a spot of resolution. It didn't really matter, though, because the story - good guys fight the bad guys - was secondary to Simone Bianchi's stunning artwork.
Bianchi's page layouts pull off the difficult double-duty of compositional beauty and perfectly smooth storytelling. His silhouetted and vignetted scenes integrate seamlessly with his bordered panels, turning the comic page into a free-standing work of art. For all his daring layout decisions, though, there was never a moment of confusion as to where the eye should go to maintain the flow of the story.
Another flaw that has become a strength is the anatomical and gestural beauty of Bianchi's figures. Early in the series, the visuals were plagued by one too many moments of uncomfortable drawing. I don't know what made the difference, but by issue #4, his figures were moving and posing with consistently classical grace. This elegance combined with the gentle rendering and rich tones to bring to mind nothing short of the work of painting's Renaissance-era old masters. If only the old masters had depicted scenes of interdimensional knights chopping off the top halves of their zombie-counterparts' heads.
There were a couple of minor visual missteps. I don't think Dave Stewart's colors meshed very well with Bianchi's halftones. Sometimes the mix worked out as a happy accident, building a magical, atmospheric mood, but more often the result was a murky, obscurant haze. I also felt that Bianchi "cheated" a little bit by slightly changing his depiction of Justin after the revelation of the aforementioned plot twist. Minor issues, to be sure. All in all, the art in this series improved by leaps and bounds from the beginning to the end. The glimpses of greatness that popped up in the first issue blossomed into an all-out visual feast by the fourth.
[For further reading, Jog the Blog has a thorough look at the Shining Knight series as a whole as well as the inconsistencies between this issue and Zatanna #3.]
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Posted by jdonelson_nyc at September 6, 2005 12:35 PM
Comments
IT IS GENEROUS PEOPLE LIKE YOU THAT WILL ENABLE THE SURVIVORS OF THIS DISASTER TO RESTART THEIR LIVES. YOU INSPIRE OTHERS TO DO THE SAME. THANKYOU
Posted by: DAN RIGOLE at September 9, 2005 10:15 AM