Now that this year’s Pilot Season competition has been decided, it’s time to premiere the winners from 2007—starting with Cyblade.
Cyblade #1
Writer: Joshua Hale Fialkov
Artist: Rick Mays
Covers: Rick Mays (A, featured below) and Kenneth Rocafort (B and Baltimore Comic-Con)
Summary: “It’s the ’season premiere’ of one of last year’s Pilot Season winners! You voted for it, you got it! From the pages of Marc Silvestri’s Cyberforce comes a solo series for Cyblade!
Set in the days before she joined Cyberforce, Dominique Thiebaut has been leading a double life. By day she’s an awkward teenager, but at night, a chip in her brain changes her into the deadly master assassin Cyblade. With the ability to create psychic blades of energy, she’s an expert in everything from thieving to assassination, performing industrial espionage for the seemingly benevolent Cyberdata corporation. But with the help of a spy sent to infiltrate the company, Cyblade has broken free from Cyberdata’s control. She must find a way to escape from their clutches for good, all the while trying to discover who she really is beneath.”
Review: After reading that summary, let’s lay out more of the playing field (thanks to the helpful snippet at the beginning of the issue). Because of the mechanisms of the Cyberdata Corporation’s Brainbox technology, Dominique’s double life can be kept separate even from herself. But after suffering an injury that damages the Brain Box, the truth comes out from her handler, Steven Rashell—who is part of a movement to free cybernetically enhanced mutants. Now Rashell—who barely escaped a Cyberdata assassin—is the subject of Cyblade’s top mission: to find and kill him, that is.
Now that the stage is set, on the review!
I didn’t catch Cyblade when it premiered in last year’s Pilot Season contest, but this seems like it’s going to be a fun comic. I’m interested in seeing where it goes and learning more about the protagonist, who’s rather underused in this issue. In fact, it might be because I missed out on last year’s Pilot Season, but even for an official first issue this seemed a little messy. There were a lot of characters and things going on that weren’t really introduced strongly enough.
Still, the overall concept is definitely cool and has a lot of potential to develop, both character and story-wise. So I wouldn’t say that this is the greatest issue, but I’m excited for what’s to come—especially because at the end of this issue, Cyblade’s memory is jogged and we see flashes of things locked in her brain that she has forgotten. Things could become very interesting soon enough!
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:37 pm
Yeah this definitely sounds cool! Although I’ll have to admit, if it weren’t for the brain chip thing, I wouldn’t check this out. The “awkward teen by day/spy by night” thing is totally worn out. How many spins on this concept are going to be done?
I still wanna check it out because the concept is cool… I also think it would be cool if she were an awkward/crazy homeless person by day instead!! Has that been done? XD
November 3rd, 2008 at 8:27 pm
I think that’s the Batman of Zur En Arrh you’re speaking of … oh, SNAP!
November 4th, 2008 at 10:08 am
Hahahahaaa!
November 4th, 2008 at 10:15 am
Where did I put my shopping cart … x)