Turok Vol. 1: Blood Hunt

Gold Key - Dynamite

by Chuck Wendig, Álvaro Sarraseca (Artist)

The fascist Saurian soldiers of the Varanid Empire-part dinosaur, part man, all bad news-have seized control of the Lost Valley, and only the mysterious man known as Turok is willing to stand against them! But the all-new Turok only cares about one he's on a quest to track down a missing girl - and she might hold clues as to how the Lost Valley has changed so much!
Now Turok must infiltrate a prison camp run by the Varanid Empire in order to get more information about her whereabouts -- and beware, any Varanid soldier who gets in his way - because there's a reason they call him the Dinosaur Hunter!

Genres: Comics, Fantasy, Dinosaurs

140 pages, Paperback

First published May 16, 2018

About the author

Chuck Wendig is a novelist, a screenwriter, and a freelance penmonkey.
He has contributed over two million words to the roleplaying game industry, and was the developer of the popular Hunter: The Vigil game line (White Wolf Game Studios / CCP).

He, along with writing partner Lance Weiler, is a fellow of the Sundance Film Festival Screenwriter's Lab (2010). Their short film, Pandemic, will show at the Sundance Film Festival 2011, and their feature film HiM is in development with producer Ted Hope.

Chuck's novel Double Dead will be out in November, 2011.

He's written too much. He should probably stop. Give him a wide berth, as he might be drunk and untrustworthy. He currently lives in the wilds of Pennsyltucky with a wonderful wife and two very stupid dogs. He is represented by Stacia Decker of the Donald Maass Literary Agency.

You can find him at his website, terribleminds.com.

Reviews

[47Time · Rating 4 out of 5]

Everything is changed from the previous books. Turok is no longer a native-american, the world is being run by dinosaur-people, time is distorted and different timelines overlap. It's a pretty effective clusterf**k. Turok does have his combat skill and his affection for another character drives him forward, but he won't end well for his efforts. This story is arguably better than the other ones I've read, even though it resets the main character. Or maybe because of it. The ending is certainly worth it.

The new Turok is fighting the dinosaur-people of the Varanid Empire. He is believed to be a hero by the few who have heard of his exploits. His goal is to search for his young daughter, but, given his combat experience, he must work for the people he meets along the way for their own gain.

Turok finds that his daughter is being taken to Vex, the imperator, and gets Marak and Nettle, two other prisoners, to follow him to the city of Ak-Tha. The Cult of the Evernight captures them, but turns out to be opponents of the emperor, just like Turok. They have a plan to kill Vex during his breeding ceremony and, given that Turok's daughter is one of Vex's captives, Turok agrees to help. Instead of a surgical strike, they bring nuclear missles, so it's really a suicide run.

In the last issue the reason why everything is so different from previous books is revealed: on the one hand you have time distortion, but on the other there's the main character who simply adopted the name Turok. He is searching for his Baby Girl because he can't remember her real name. The time distortions messed with everyone's minds, so in reality Turok's daughter was killed and Baby Girl, or Annie, is just a girl next door whom Turok believed to be his daughter.

Turok gets stabbed when he reaches the imperial chamber where Annie is the last child to be eaten by the emperor. He dies right in front of her after she hands him a key that makes him remember his true past. Then the missles explode, wiping out the whole city and allowing the humans to escape Varanid rule.

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Star

I just jumped into this and didn't realize it was a total reboot. I prefer the original Turok, whether the Gold Key or Valiant character, but this was still a good read. It involves travel between dimensions and this dimension is ruled by evil dinosaur people. Turok is a stranded Earthman on a quest to save his daughter.

I had this four stars until the ending which confused me and seemed out of place. Overall still a good read.

[Ashkin Ayub · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's another variant of the Turok storyline with considerably more urban surroundings and concepts and extremely humanoid creatures. It has superb illustrations and intriguing locales, but story-wise it oddly seems to be like seeing action films that I've seen before.

[Trike · Rating 3 out of 5]

I guess the Dynamite universe got... dynamited. So now everyone is different and everything is mashed together in a weird multiverse collision. Everything and the kitchen sink is thrown into the mix here. Nazi saurians riding dinosaurs while wielding handguns? Why not!

I guess it makes sense. There’s only so much you can do with the adventures of a Native American warrior who battles dinosaurs, and pretty much every permutation has been tried over the past 65 years. So why not make him a black guy swept up in a reality storm and transported to an insane reality overseen by gods using people and dinosaurs and dinopeople as pawns in some elaborate game? Or war, maybe? Hard to tell.

[Laissez Farrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was pleasantly surprised. Basic plot is nothing new, but the cliffhangers are top notch.

[Ron · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was a HUGE fan of the original TUROK, SON OF STONE comics in the '50s. This is a very different and engrossing re-imagining of that series by Chuck Wendig. Amazing artwork by Ávaro Sarraseca.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good art and fun world-building, but boy golly does that story need work. And what a rushed ending!