Medieval Spawn and Witchblade Volume 1

Medieval Spawn & Witchblade #2

by Brian Haberlin, Brian Holguin

SPAWN AND WITCHBLADE TOGETHER AGAIN FOR THE FIRST TIME IN DECADES! DON'T MISS OUT -- THIS IS EPIC!
An ancient evil is sweeping the world destroying and corrupting all in its path. When, suddenly, a knight SPAWNS from out of the shadows to save all. He is touted as their benevolent king of old, miraculously returned. But is he really their savior, or their destroyer?
With an evil queen, a knight in search of his past, and a young girl with an ancient weapon that could destroy them all, the world is in more danger than ever.
NOTE: Augmented reality covers and interiors for both iOS and Android devices.

Genres: Comics, Fantasy, Graphic Novels

144 pages, Paperback

First published September 26, 2018

About the author

An award-winning comic book artist, writer, editor and producer, Brian began his career in comics working at Top Cow Productions, where he co-created the Witchblade franchise. He co-founded Avalon Studios, which published many successful fantasy and sci-fi titles, including: Stone, Aria, Area 52 and M-Rex to name a few.

Brian also served for two years as Editor-in-Chief of Todd McFarlane Productions and penciled and inked its flagship title, Spawn. He currently writes and illustrates Faster Than Light and the upcoming Fury Formula comics series. Brian teaches comic art at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and his work is in the permanent collection at the Smithsonian Museum.

Reviews

[Mark · Rating 2 out of 5]

You would expect a new outing for Spawn and Witchblade together would be a great happening and visual fun.

The drawing is not as good as you would expect, the earlier Spawn and Witchblade were so well drawn that this comic somehow fails to even achieve that level at any moment.

The story was also not that great so when two major components are missing the target somehow the whole product becomes less than I actually wanted it to be.

I grew up with these two characters and do have the beginning of both series in my collection, this new release was just not good enough.

I did buy the 4 comics instead of one volume, like my recent re-visit with Witchblade it proves a waste of good money. Image comics seems to lessen their interesting output in recent years for me.

[Jakub Kvíz · Rating 1 out of 5]

Wow, tak tohle bylo slusny hovno!

Hledat v tomhle nejakej smysluplnej dej je asi tak stejne zbytecny jako hledat krk v necem, co kreslil Romita jr. Nastesti to ma jen 4 sesity, takze se to dalo i docist.

Digitalni kresba mi pripominala intro Baldur’s Gate 1, ale chapu, ze pred 15-20 lety, kdyz Haberlin zacinal kreslit Spawna, tak z toho mohli bejt lidi celkem na vetvi. Pridana augumented realita asi v roce 2018 taky nikoho nezvedne z kresla.

Kazdopadne tohle neni dobry ani pro fanousky Spawna, takze ruce pryc.

[Theediscerning · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hmmm… A book with serious scope for improvement. The digital backgrounds and landscapes add nothing, principally as the drawn artwork for the characters is shonking – Starling, in particular. And as for the story, well, that's on the more disposable end of things, even as far as these cross-over mash-ups go. You need to know the mythology of both franchises, especially Spawn – his character is defined as a humble hero, but the framing story regarding his fate isn't clear at all to the newbie. All you need know plot-wise is that a cool dude finds both a magical weapon and the woman to use it at the same time, even if he's blind, and a dodgy sprog gets promoted to squire to a king who isn't a king, and all go in search of a wicked queen, the end. Not offensively bad, but not good.

[Judah Radd · Rating 5 out of 5]

10,000 times better than I expected. It made me want to read more Medieval Spawn, and it made me want to check out more Witchblade. Exquisite, detailed and interesting art, and a really cool demonic story. Definitely something I think anyone would enjoy.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it more than I thought I would?

[Chris M · Rating 2 out of 5]

Intensely boring, muddied artwork that is far too dark and a plot that has no real reason for these characters to meet. The story could have been just either Medieval Spawn or Witchblade by themselves with no real consequences to the plot.

Feels like a contractual obligation more than something made out of the joy of creativity. Shame as I wish Medieval Spawn got more exposure in general, but alas.

Only for Spawn completionists. If you're a Witchblade fan I'm not even sure why you would want this since it's barely related to the Witchblade aside from being an ancient artifact only a woman can wield. It could easily have been any other magical macguffin weapon.

[Joey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sketchy but strangely realistic dark art with medieval style and mythical evil creatures and demons brings back the Medieval Spawn Witchblade crossover back from the days of Billy Tan and early Top Cow. I dig it.
The backdrop of the scenes and the design of the monsters shows that this one has some serious artistic creativity behind it.
The characters were dark, and evil, but also relatable and appreciable (in the case of the anti-heroes or protagonists).

[47Time · Rating 4 out of 5]

The pacing of the story changes drastically by the end. What is a slow burn in the beginning is too quickly resolved in a handful of pages. It's magic, but it didn't have to that fast. Most of the focus on this comic is on the artwork. Sure, accuse it of being shallow, but you have admit it's gorgeous with its impressive vistas, woderful character design and amazing level of complexity. If you are looking for a Stjepan Sejic-level photorealistic artwork, look no further. 

King Valon's kingdom has been destroyed by the Dark Forces that corrupted the land years before. When most have abandoned hope, the king returns in the skin of the Spawn. He vows to rid his kingdom of the Dark Forces and restore it to its former beauty. Meanwhile Sea Hawk the blind seer discovers Starling, a former princess who can find and wield the long-lost Witchblade thanks to her bloodline.

Valon heads for his castle to reunite with his queen Rielle. On the way he meets Starling who has separated from Sea Hawk and whose mind has been clouded by poison spores. She attacks before the effect of the spores is dissipated by Sea Hawk. The group realises that they have all been under the influence of the three queens: Mother, Daughter and Unholy Spirit.

The Scourge the queens sent to attack Spawn is in reality King Valon. Spawn is Valon's friend and battle companion Leith who betrayed the king on the field of battle and bedded the king's wife Rielle. Upon his return to her he saw her true form and threw himself to his death. Malebolgia offered Leith the chance to redeem himself as Spawn.

With all the heroes opposing them, the queens transform into a giant monster that the Witchblade's earthly power cannot defeat. Spawn spends the hell energy in his necroplasmic body to win the day. To save his soul from returning to serve Malebolgia, Sea Hawk and Starling send him into the future where he can become whatever he chooses.

[Peyton F · Rating 2 out of 5]

Comics is a medium that is words *and* pictures. It’s a balancing act, in which the words ought to improve and/or be additive to the visual aspect, and the art should, similarly, cover ground that simple prose would take paragraphs to explain. “Medieval Spawn and Witchblade” utilizes digital 3D Backgrounds (and I think even 3D Model work) that is sometimes drawn over to create a fairly stale and bland narrative, which the writing doesn’t assist with as it tries to cling to “Sword and Sorcery” lingo and speaking, making it come across as an Old Thor comic (and not one of the good old Thors, either) with Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion 3D design. It makes for a bad experience the longer you read. Medieval Spawn has an interesting (if overly detailed and muddied) design and origin, and the twist was fun, but Starling (the Witchblade) is another example of me, once again, having no clue wtf the Witchblade does. I think an “any Weapon” is such a cheap thing to wield. There are better Witchblade stories out there than this one (like the 2024 reboot), and I wonder if there is any new Medieval Spawn stories that top this. I’m interested in Gunslinger Spawn. Is there a pirate Spawn? Caveman Spawn?

[Paul Allard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Strong fantasy comic collection which works quite well

Medieval isn’t really the right word here as, although it’s a tale of knights, monsters and pitched as a story from long ago, it takes place in a world which is not our own. King Avalon is resurrected as the Hellspawn and Starling gains the Witchblade. Along with a couple of interesting secondary characters, they fight against magical beings and monsters.

At the end of this volume, there’s a gallery of artwork which, for me, showed how black-and-white illustrations would have worked better than the coloured final versions. However this is minor and the collection is a success on the whole.

[Joey · Rating 4 out of 5]

The tone of this book is fitting for both of it's protagonists.

[Guillaume · Rating 3 out of 5]

Way better than the previous iteration but still far from a gion story

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

4.47

I love the medieval setting

More like this please!!

[GONZA · Rating 2 out of 5]

The original Spawn has better illustrations by far.