Issue #1 - The first issue review and explanation of what I'm doing here.
Issue #2 - The set up continues.
Issue #3 - Prison break.
Issue #4 - Attack on the city.
Issue #5 - Battle and first story arc conclusion.
Issue #6 - New villains are introduced. Red Monika side story.
Issue #7 - Sebastius makes his move.
Issue #8 - Sebastius reveals himself.
The story so far: Sebastius revealed himself on the battle field with the undead monstrosity. Stabbing Garrison in the back and seemingly achieving all his goals. Gully was eaten on purpose and destroyed the monster from within. She was knocked out though and Sebastius took Aramus' Gauntlets gaining the power he was after. However, they rejected him and ripped his arms off.
The final issue begins with Sebastius' backstory. Aramus knocks up a lady and leaves her. Sebastius is raised thinking Aramus is a good person and a great warrior so he wants to be like him. Years later he wakes up to an attack. He runs into Aramus who says not to harm the boy.
Turns out he just took the necklace off the boy and said it was because he'd make a good slave. Making Aramus seem like a bad guy. However, this is just Sebastius telling the story to Gully. So it may or may not be true. Gully certainly does not believe him. She does have the necklace that Sebastius had in the story though, so there is some doubt in her now.
Sebastius is in a jail cell. With no arms. Gully does not have her gauntlets anymore because King Vaneer has them locked up. After fantasizing about gaining their power, Maestro shows up and King Vaneer orders him to gather his men and look for Red Monika.
Garrison has already head out looking for her though.
We also get to see Knolan some again. He is still searching for proof that August is back. But he runs into a monster named Snaggletoof instead.
Gully and Calibretto are together when Knolan teleports back to the city and cuts Snaggletoof's arm off as it was trying to follow him through the portal.
Garrison meanwhile, finds one of Monika's henchmen. The one that does not talk. After a bit of scuffle, he is shown what happened and is taken to Monika.
The issue ends with a bunch of wolves (or maybe Lycelots?) seemingly about to attack them.
There is a bonus story in this one as well. It is mostly a younger Red Monika and Garrison sparring. And it kind of ties in because Garrison promises to never hunt her down and kill her or let anyone else. This is when he was about to head off to become a paladin.
Well... that's it. All the Battle Chasers comics. And as expected. We are left on major cliffhangers. Barely even got started with August. Red Monika was only really in a couple issues. I don't know... just feels like such a waste. The series had so much potential. I'm obviously not alone either if you check out the sales numbers.
It kills me that this series was abandoned. And now they've taken 3+ years to not really deliver on the promised 3 issues from the game kickstarter. I also just read not long ago that they are still going forward with those, which is great. But Joe Mad will not be doing the artwork. WTF? Leave a series in limbo for 20 years then promise a measly 3 issues, and you can't even do them yourself?
The story, characters, etc... already exist. It is not like he has to do a crazy amount of work here. I feel like he'd be better off just admitting he does not want to do it. Rather than giving some of the excuses he has, which are always time constraints or money. Both of which are pretty much BS. 20+ years for 3 issues is plenty of time... I don't care how busy you are. And money is not an issue.
If you look back at the sales charts of the 9 issues, they always did 60k+. Issue 10 was pre-ordered at over 64k. And most of this was AFTER the 90s bubble burst. The series started in 98. That was already toward the end of the comics bubble. Issue 10 would have been going out at the end of 2002. The bubble had burst around that time, yet Battle Chasers was still doing 60k+ orders. For those that don't know if that's good or not. If a comic does that now it'd be top 10 on the sales charts. Even if you sold it for $3 which is super low for new comics (greedy bastards...) and you guess 2/3 of the revenue is cost/expenses, he'd be coming home with $64,000 for a single issue. I don't know about you, but if I could make even half that self publishing a comic book monthly, I'd be pretty happy with my 6 figure salary... but still. Maybe he does not want to do comics. That's fine. But say that. Busy or cost is no longer an excuse in this case.
In case you wanted to see the numbers:
Battle Chasers #9 had an estimated 68,772 units - Comichron: June 2001 Comic Book Sales to Comics Shops
#10 had an estimated 65,320 orders already - Comichron: November 2001 Comic Book Sales to Comics Shops
#1 had 78,479 - Comichron: April 1998 Comic Book Sales to Comics Shops
Anyway... enough with the ranting. I don't know why he has chosen to neglect his IP all these years. There's obviously plenty of demand for it. The game has done relatively well also.
I still love Battle Chasers. At least what we got. I hope you all enjoyed these reviews.
Thinking for the next series I may keep going with the Fantasy theme and do Warlands. But not sure. May not do it right away either.
If anyone ever has something they'd like to see feel free to make suggestions! I have over 3000 comic books. Chances are I either have it or could get ahold of it to read/review.
To Be Continued! (Or not... because who wants to continue a top 15 comic book that fans love?)
