Shadowman: End Times

Shadowman (2012) (Collected Editions) #5

by Peter Milligan, Valentine De Landro (Illustrator)

The end times are now! Master storyteller Peter Milligan is pushing Shadowman to the edge - but can Jack Boniface survive the plunge? Jack thought he'd finally fixed his life and the source of his dark power. But when a figure from the past emerges with a troubling revelation about his destiny, the new Shadowman will plummet into an abyss far darker than any demon. Make no mistake, doom is coming for Shadowman!

Collecting: Shadowman: End Times 1-3

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Horror, Fantasy, Fiction, Comic Book, Superheroes

Comic

First published September 9, 2014

About the author

Librarian note:
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name

Peter Milligan is a British writer, best known for his work on X-Force / X-Statix, the X-Men, & the Vertigo series Human Target. He is also a scriptwriter.

He has been writing comics for some time and he has somewhat of a reputation for writing material that is highly outlandish, bizarre and/or absurd.

His highest profile projects to date include a run on X-Men, and his X-Force revamp that relaunched as X-Statix.

Many of Milligan's best works have been from DC Vertigo. These include: The Extremist (4 issues with artist Ted McKeever) The Minx (8 issues with artist Sean Phillips) Face (Prestige one-shot with artist Duncan Fegredo) The Eaters (Prestige one-shot with artist Dean Ormston) Vertigo Pop London (4 issues with artist Philip Bond) Enigma (8 issues with artist Duncan Fegredo) and Girl (3 issues with artist Duncan Fegredo).

Series:
* Human Target
* Greek Street
* X-Force / X-Statix

Reviews

[Patrick · Rating 1 out of 5]

The hell did I just read?

Look, I loved the fourth volume of the Shadowman series where Milligan changed up some of the rules of the character that led us here. But, there were more than a few missteps in this event that someone should have caught in editing.

Let's start with art. The art is atrocious. Compared to the last volume, this was bargain basement at best. And the thing is, the pencils shown in the back are pretty darn good. It's the colorist that jacked this art up. And someone should have said something.

The story? This was "too much" in the sense that you needed to suspend disbelieve or overlook certain character inconsistencies too often to keep the plot moving forward. None of the extreme actions feel earned.

And that brings me to my biggest disappointment...how did this story get from here to the character I've been looking for since reading Rapture? I'll ahve to look up the reading order and see if I didn't miss an event or issue that gets me from this garbage fire to either what it was last issue or where it is by Rapture.

[Dr Rashmit Mishra · Rating 2 out of 5]

IGN defines this series as masterful storytelling . Me and IGN clearly don't see eye to eye when it comes to comics . So IGN ,who laughably rated the DC rebirth one shot as a " average and anticlimatic prologue " , might sing praises for this , i'll just need one word to describe this book and the whole series of Shadowman - RUBBISH !

with the stories of the previous issues already being annoying and bad one expected things to get better with the final issue of the series but nOooooo... instead Mr Miligan continued with the same story of Shadowman having a split personality of sort that's basically a psychotic killer and then we learn that his father is actually alive and to reach him he will sacrifice his love for the girl who professed her love in a very forceful and abrupt manner in the first place*

* so basically a fitting end to that so called romance

with the ending having atleast been a unique twist one can't stop but feel that had another author or a different approach been taken , This might have turned out to be a lot better comics as a whole . For now Shadowman is the worst comics i have read in 2016 or maybe in a long time . Definitely suggest that you don't ever pick this series up

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 1 out of 5]

I rarely give out 1 star ratings, but this one warranted it. Shadowman has for some reason turned into a stupid idiot making totally irrational decisions. I suppose the idea was the Loa was influencing him, but since that was never really touched upon until the previous volume, and really only lightly touched upon here, the explanation didn't work. Shadowman brings Master Darque back to life just so he can find his father..with the intent to kill him? And then, without too much of a spoiler, Shadowman just goes bad at the end? Huh? I don't think I've ever had a series go downhill so fast. This volume didn't even have the cool art of the last one. (Not that the art was horrible, but the last volume had above average art which at least saved it to a point.)

This one had so many problems I can't even get into all of them. I just didn't care for it at all.

[Judah Radd · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hated.

Absolutely hated.

Nothing in this book made sense. It was completely devoid of satisfaction, intrigue or meaningful drama. I think the goal was “introspective,” but it missed the mark in a big way.

It’s a shame, because the art was pretty cool... although I could tell that even Valentine De Landro was pretty demotivated by Peter Milligan’s abysmal script.

Imagine watching a really boring person be “introspective” over the course of three painful issues while barely moving the needle on the story. Imagine that all the “introspection” leads to exactly 0 meaningful character developments. Imagine that every supporting character is an empty shell of an NPC. That’s this book. I expected better from a Valiant story. Can’t wait to read another writer’s take on Shadowman. Such a waste.

2 stars (would be 1 if the art wasn’t cool)

[Art the Turtle of Amazing Girth · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.09

Dark, awesome, and compelling

I'll be collecting the rest of this series for sure

[Cale · Rating 1 out of 5]

My interest in Shadowman stems from the fondly remembered 3rd-Person Action Adventure game from the late 90's. I stuck with this series even though it had little if anything in common (one character crossed over, and that wasn't Shadowman; a familiar named Jaunty, who exists as a completely different animal here), because there was so much potential in the concept. But none of it is executed on here. Instead of exploring the voodoo culture and the concept of deadside, we have 100 pages of navel-gazing possession-as-metaphor-for-addiction, with a side helping of pseudo-Oedipal 'plot.' Jack Bonaface was a poor character from the start, and this 'finale' just highlighted how weak he is. None of the characters introduced in the series are shown in a positive light in the last book, and everything that was set as back-story is thrown out. It was actively painful to finish this book; to see such a unique foundation for a world completely ignored (or in some cases slapdashedly created then swept aside), makes me think it was a mercy that they finally killed it off. Shadowman as a concept deserves much better than the Valiant reboot gave it, even at its best. These last two volumes are just embarrassing. I like Peter Milligan's writing elsewhere, but I get the sense he didn't really care about the characters here, and gave the readers no reason to care either.

[Wing Kee · Rating 1 out of 5]

Garbage.

World: The art is okay, the only good thing about this series. The world building here is patchy and serves the story but doesn't really stand on it's own as something interesting.

Story and Characters: Oh wow this is trash. This arc pretty much destroys Jack as a character and wipes away any good parts about him. What he does and what chooses on this arc is utterly pathetic and stupid. It's not written well and the reason behind it. Alyssa continues to be an object for Milligan and that annoys. The dad stuff, illogical, the mom stuff, illogical. The world, illogical. The Darque stuff, illogical.

This series has been nothing but utter dung, where are they getting the blurps from?!

Onward to the next book!

[Daniel Butcher · Rating 1 out of 5]

This might be my most unfavorite Valaint collection to date.

I felt like the story failed to resolve, though it was a mini-series. And I felt like a lesson was hanging out there, that we never learned.

Overall I found myself losing interest as I read deeper.

[Michael J. · Rating 4 out of 5]

In my opinion, Shadowman is one of the most under-utilized and under-developed characters in the Valiant universe. Peter Milligan dives deep into his mental state, writes a solid, short psychological profile with plenty of traumatic conflicts (not physical, but of the soul-searching type). He gets to the root of what makes the character more interesting to me, explores it, resolves some of that inner turmoil (not necessarily in a good way, though) and sets a new direction for future stories with a cliffhanger ending.
What surprised me even more than that ending was the number of unfavorable reviews (one or two stars) here on Goodreads, with very few ratings of three stars or higher. This series definitely struck the wrong chord with fans of Shadowman. I'm guessing that this was just too much of a departure from what came before, and really upset the applecart. While I'm a fan of the character, I have not been following his infrequent mini-series with various writers. The last Shadowman series that impressed me as much as SHADOWMAN: END TIMES was the limited run by Garth Ennis for the short-lived Acclaim ownership of Valiant. In fact, I'm so out of touch with what's been going on with this character that I did not read this 2014 series until now. I read this in the individual monthly issues, which I gleefully found in a back issue bargain bin at a local comic shop.
I'll risk the ire of other reviewers by concluding that this is one of my all-time favorite Shadowman stories.

[Chris Lemmerman · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't often go with 1 star for my reviews. It takes a lot to annoy me so much that I'd give a story one star, but this one? This one managed it.

I've enjoyed Shadowman, but it hasn't been the same since Justin Jordan was on it, and this final volume which is billed as 'End Times', so you'd expect some kind of resolution to the story, is not fun at all.

This is basically Peter Milligan throwing all of the story points we've had so far into a blender, pointing at a way of sorting it all out, and then throwing it all away for a completely unfulfilling cliffhanger ending that just made me angry. This isn't how Jack's story should end, and there was plenty of time to take it another way.

The art also doesn't fit the book at all. Valentine De Landro is very good at doing a lot with a little, but the lack of backgrounds and character details means that the art comes across unfinished, and even the splash pages aren't particularly nice to look at.

This is a disappointment of the highest order, unfortunately.

[John]

I feel like Shadowman perhaps has one of the more...complicated histories and set-ups for the Valiant Universe. Like Hawkman, he's a generational character with multiverse variations based on reboots, revisions, revamps etc. If I'm not mistaken, there's been at least four itinerations as a comics protagonist since his creation in 1992.

This is one of the 2012 Valiant Entertainment "light" event comics. Only three issues, it throws some rather large revelations regarding the character--and Valiant keeps a solid roster of talent, this time using Peter Milligan.

I feel ultimately this arc is more about plot development then characterization.

[Shannon Appelcline · Rating 3 out of 5]

End Times (ET1-3). End Times nicely dovetails Jack's story back into the history of the Shadowman. It's got some really meaningful meetings and events, primarily in the last issue. However, it's plagued with two major problems. First, the story is too sparse, leaving a lot of dead space that you have to trudge through, primarily in the first two issues; and second, it's inconclusive, and thus a horrible finale to the story of Shadowman [5/10].

[Sean · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wow, it seems like Peter Milligan does everything in his power to make this book unlikable. Jack Boniface is the main character but I can't imagine why someone would care. The supernatural side of the book the only thing that could be good but its done so poorly that nothing is explained or at least explained well. The art is also a let down. Overall, a pretty awful outing.

[Tomas · Rating 1 out of 5]

I cannot believe that this is the end of Shadowman. What a shitty ending. Whole Shadowman story could be replaced by evil loa almost completely possessing Jack and the result would be the same. It basically undoes whole Shadowman series

[RND · Rating 2 out of 5]

A bit melodramatic, and I wish Jack's turmoil was a little better-handled, because he's aggressively ignorant at times just to serve plot purposes. But ending at such a cliffhanger was kind of a wet blanket.

[Adam Stone · Rating 1 out of 5]

If I weren't trying to read the entirety of the Valiant Universe, I wouldn't have picked this up. I strongly disliked the previous volume of Shadowman, but this one was much, much worse.

This book's cancellation was a mercy killing.

[Jessica Woods · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vol.4 features a impressive new story arc that was better than the last couple of books.The art is very dark, scratchy, and bleak feeling with almost no color. The story left me wanting more.

[Marjolein (UrlPhantomhive) · Rating 1 out of 5]

Full review to come!

[Chad · Rating 1 out of 5]

Wow! I thought the previous Peter Milligan Shadowman trade was bad but this takes the cake. The characterizations of these character makes no sense. Milligan has tried to turn this into a 90's era Vertigo book and it does not work one iota. Substitute possession for drug addiction and we've got Trainspotting as a comic. A miniseries should be resolved by the end of it. Instead in the last issue we resurrect a guy who tries to destroy the world so we could meet Daddy and then decide to serve Master Darque. Complete and utter garbage.

[Anchorpete · Rating 4 out of 5]

No offense to Justin Jordan, but this book really took off after Peter Milligan took over. I said the same thing in my review for the previous trade, and then I scrolled down to see that many people had actually hated what Milligan had done to the book. In my eyes, he took a book that was a better quality, 90's superhero/horror book, akin to Spawn or Haunt and turned it into a Vertigo book from the late 90's early 2000s.
Milligan continues to build upon the shadowman mythos with this book, really fleshing out Jack Boniface's father, and really demonstrating how awful the price is to have the Shadowman Loa. I think Modern Valiant needs this kind of book. Modern Valiant is so great right now, and this is just the kind of dark, haunted title it needs to have a well rounded selection of titles.

[Aaron Swensen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Like all of the Shadowman books from the "new" Valiant, I just couldn't get into it. I don't get Jack's motivation at all. It's clear the loa has a negative effect on him, but he's written in such a way that I can't sympathise, and I don't see any of his actions making sense. I had high hopes for this mini-series, hoping it would redeem what has been a pretty dull and pointless series. I can only recommend #0 and #10 of the regular Shadowman series, both of which give the origin of Master Darque. Anything else just isn't worth it. I would, however, recommend the original Shadowman series from "old" Valiant of the 90's.

[Eric Novello · Rating 2 out of 5]

Shadowman: End Times reúne três números da HQ, num total de 112 páginas. Eu gosto bastante da fase Justin Jordan e estava disposto a gostar da fase Peter Milligan, já que o cara tinha trabalhado em Batman e Hellblazer. O reboot que ocupou o arco Fear Blood The Shadows trouxe um tom mais dark bem interessante, que casou bem com a ambientação. Mas End Times é o Milligan andando em volta do poste, com evolução zero do personagem, como se tivesse cumprindo cota de contrato. Além disso, a arte do Valentine De Landro não deu conta do recado, e até o lettering, a escolha das fontes ficou estranha, bem aquém da fase Birth Rites.

[Rick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Peter Milligan continues to illustrate just how talented he is with this latest Shadowman collected edition. End Times takes Boniface into some really troubling narrative territories and Milligan handles it with his usual flair and style. Shadowman is the one title from the relaunched Vertigo that continues to be interesting.

[John · Rating 2 out of 5]

A few great touches, but mostly boring.

[Greg Trosclair · Rating 2 out of 5]

God awful crap. Worst book Pete Milligan has written. Worst Valiant book to date.

[Lukas Holmes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful.

[J. · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is great because it completely ruins the main character, as well as the previous Shadowman. So that's an interesting approach to the book.

[Ritinha · Rating 2 out of 5]

Os clichés, os clichés aos molhos... com algumas boas ideias soltas, sub-aproveitadas para dar relevância aos... clichés.