Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Imagine two of your very good friends taking off for a couple of years and going on all kinds of great adventures, but not bothering to invite you. Eventually they return home and tell you about how great it all was; meanwhile, you're wishing you could have been a part of the adventures as well. Feeling left out? Welcome to The Black Dossier. So goes my experience with this entry to the series. While this is reported to be something of an aside rather than the "true" 3rd entry to the series, it reads like an epilogue. Worse, The Black Dossier details numerous adventures of the League in its various incarnations, many of which are quite compelling and engaging, yet this is a book about TELLING the reader of these fantastic adventures, NOT showing them. We read reports about Mina and Allan in American dealing with Cthulhu horrors, or facing off with a rival league in France, but these are presented as rather dull after action debriefings or journals, often just pages of text, perhaps taking the "novel" portion of "graphic novel" too far, and not giving the reader involvement or a stake in these adventures. Even if future volumes were to detail the various exploits mentioned, they would be hamstrung given the publication of the play by play detailed within--terribly disappointing for a series that unlike many other comics, is willing to kill of major characters and surprise the reader. Regardless, in The Black Dossier, of the original League of volumes 1 and 2, only Mina Harker (now a striking blonde) and Allan Quartermain return for the bulk of the story (both appearing quite young courtesy of a peculiar find in Africa, slyly revealed to the reader while it goes over the heads of British Intelligence), and steal The Black Dossier from a post George Orwell's 1984 England. The overall plot is little more than a straightforward chase (to use the term generously) as Mina and Allan flee England with The Black Dossier, although there is little sense of danger or urgency as the pair leisurely take flight, giving the impression of being on holiday rather than at any real risk. (The main action sequence, which takes place in a "space port", is brief and neither Mina nor Allan is particularly challenged by their opposition). As usual, Mina (rightfully so) takes the lead, although poor Allan does little other than ask obvious questions so that clumsy exposition dialogue can tumble from Mina's mouth in an effort to explain what is going on and why. Again, the reader is often told rather than shown--a strange choice for this medium--and given the rather "extraordinary" exploits of volume 1 and 2, nothing here even comes close to matching the excitement. The story comes across as rather mundane, more "Jason Bourne" (well, James Bond) than fantastic until the very end--and ending which amounts to little more than a tour, rather than any kind of significant resolution (such as volume 1) or cliffhanger (volume 2). The Mina and Allan of fifty years later seem a bit like shadows of the characters fans of the series came to respect and appreciate in the first two volumes: Allan is largely insignificant and Mina is a mouthpiece for the writers, neither is allowed to flourish as characters or grow. While I found this volume largely disappointing, there are numerous interesting bits throughout The Black Dossier, although these are individual nuggets here and there. For instance, the character of Orlando is introduced through an eighteen page back story, detailing how the immortal character "Forest Gumps" his (or her) way through 3,000 years of human history while often changing genders--it reads much better than it sounds in this review, yet the character has little to do with the story as a whole, other than a few other intriguing mentions during other League adventures the reader misses out on and what amounts to a cameo appearance at the end. This introduction, as well as the introduction of many numerous other characters (members of the League, rivals) give the feel of a rich and textured world that the reader is only given a sliver or glimpse to enjoy--frustrating when there is clearly much more than could be done with both this text and the series. Other sections of the book are small treasures, such as the "PornSec SexJane PicTell" insert (1984) and the postcards written by the League and sent to British Intelligence over their many adventures. The literary and fictional references are not only present in this volume as the previous, but the volume is turned up to 11, giving those who enjoy the "Where's Waldo?" aspect of the League plenty to appreciate in this volume. The production values are also amazing. Overall, for those readers coming to the series from the "LXG" movie, the graphic novels have nothing in common with the movie other than the shared name. Of the three, The Black Dossier is certainly the worst choice for anyone curious about the series, given it's clearly written for those already familiar with the characters and world. As another volume of the series, I found it was a disappointment, even if judged as a tangent to the "core" series of stories (which seems to beg for a sliding scale that The Black Dossier sorely needs). There definitely are gems here for the dedicated fan of the series (and frankly, those might be enough for the diehard fans), but the generally weak story and "tell, don't show" feel of the book far outweighed positives. If this were published as an epilogue after ten or twelve volumes of the League, I believe I would give it a positive review (under the assumption that the numerous adventures were told about were detailed elsewhere), yet published after the first two volumes The Black Dossier serves as little more than a clumsy tangent or (worse), as a spoiler for what could have been many engaging adventures of the League in its various incarnations.