Reborn #5
Writer: Mark Millar
Artist: Greg Capullo
Inker: Jonathan Glapion
Colorist: FCO Plascencia
Letterer: Nate Piekos
Publisher: Image Comics
A review by Stephanie Pouliotte
Reborn #5 is an ambitious issue, ramping up quickly to set up the prophesied battle between good and evil we’ve been moving towards the whole series. Bonnie and Big Tom have a lot of ground to cover since their escape from General Frost last issue, so Reborn #5 opens with a short montage of their adventures fighting their way back to the Adystrian border. I love that we get into Bonnie’s head here, as she narrates how her life has changed since she was reborn, finally bringing a bit more colour to her character and delving into her thoughts about her life after death.
Capullo’s artwork is so amazing in these first pages that it really made me yearn to know more about what they were actually doing. Seriously, each of those panels could be its own issue and I would be totally on board. Capullo paints a beautifully rich world filled with wizards fighting tidal waves, behemoths touting cities on their backs, and six-armed giants covered in tattoos, yet we only get a glimpse into these ridiculously thrilling side stories. I know they had to keep the plot moving, but I wish we could have seen Bonnie and Big Tom duke it out with some of these fantastical beasts, especially since we haven’t really seen Bonnie in action much. I hope the battle in the next issue is worth the wait!
As much as I enjoyed getting to know Bonnie, the opening narration was a bit on the nose. Luckily Millar moves away from this as the two reminisce by the fireside, and we get to see a bond between father and daughter that not even death could erode. Then Bonnie drops the big question that’s been on my mind since the second issue, what if her mother was reborn in the Dark Lands and that’s why Roy Boy couldn’t find her all these years? Of course we don’t get a straight answer, Millar is keeping everything up in the air until the final climatic battle with Lord Golgatha, though we do basically find out who he is by the end of this issue. I’m not going to spoil anything, but I’m not sure how I feel about it. It really depends on how everything ties together in the next issue. We also learn Harry’s whereabouts, which is more realistic and conflicting, but how Bonnie handles the situation tells us more about her character than anything else thus far. We finally get to see the kind of person she is as she confidently steps into her role as a hero and leaves her past life behind.
The Verdict
Buy it! Reborn #5 does what it set out to do. It’s a good precursor to the final issue that ties up some loose ends, tightens Bonnie’s resolve, and leads us into the Dark Lands for the final showdown. Honestly, you should pick it up for Capullo’s artwork alone, it’s that good, but having seen his pencils on Twitter, it’s the colouring by FCO Plascencia that really brings this issue to life.
