Butterfly
Written by Marguerite Bennett
Art by Antonio Fuso (Chapters 1&2) and Stefano Simeone (Chapters 3&4)
Archaia
I wanted to like this one, truly I did.
I mean when you have USA Today quoted as noting “intrigue and explosions galore … with a modern Jason Bourne-type secret agent and a Cold War cover operative a la John le Carré …” you become hopeful of a good read.
But Butterfly never gets past mediocrity.
I never found a character I cared about in the book.
The art was serviceable but nothing more.
Fifty-pages in I could have closed the pdf and never gave it another thought.
I persevered to the end, and it was just time away from reading something better.
The only caveat I’ll place on this is that in the past few days I have read two Velvet TPBs, and two issues of Codename Baboushka, which have similar female leads in espionage-themed stories, so maybe Butterfly was too much of the same in too short a time.
But my suggestion is to buy Velvet and pass on Butterfly which is too much a caterpillar.
Codename Baboushka #1
Written by Antony Johnston
Art by Shari Chankhamma
Image Comics
The idea behind Codename Baboushka caught my attention.
Baboushka is a Russian heiress, a criminal, assassin, blackmailed covert government operative and hot. It is the stuff great yarns are made of, even if not a particularly original background I suppose.
And writer Antony Johnston does a credible enough job on issue #1. There is plenty of action, some nice bread crumbs to follow as the series moves forward in terms of who and what Baboushka really is, hero or villain.
There is also the Extrajudicial Operations Network to better get to know, although they seem to be the usual ultra-CIA type organization we often see in such books.
So don’t expect anything new.
That’s fine though. This should be straight escapism wrapped up in 30-page segments.
Sadly though for that to work Baboushka has to draw kick-ass sexy. The art has to carry the fight scenes. The art needs to be Wow! Artist Shari Chankhamma doesn’t come close to wow. It is in fact, bland art. The kind I’d expect from an indie produced comic from some high school kids just learning to draw comics.
The art is a turn-off, and while I will push my way through issue #2, I’m not expecting this one to hold me long based on the art alone.
