Tag Archives: pacific rim: tales from the drift

Pacific Rim: Ultimate Omnibus is Out Now

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In 2013, Legendary Entertainment and Warner Brother’s Pacific Rim impacted into theaters bringing to life giant robots and giant monsters as they had never been seen before. Legendary Comics expanded on the mythology of this universe with Pacific Rim: Tales from Year Zero, a prequel graphic novel presented by Guillermo Del Toro and written by Pac Rim screenwriter Travis Beacham and a stellar art team consisting of Sean Chen, Yvel Guichet, Pericles Junior, Chris Batista, and Geoff Shaw. The rich universe and mythology that had been devised by the filmmakers and Legendary left a universe of stories that could be told. 

Pacific Rim: Tales from the Drift arrived in 2015 once again from screenwriter Beacham and television writer/comic creator Joshua Fialkov and the art team of Marcos Marz and Marcello Miaolo. This tale of a pilot couple linked by marriage and the drift brought a new level of drama to the action.

In 2018, a second movie, Pacific Rim Uprising, descended and with a new set of characters, Jaegers and Kaiju. Cavan Scott took the reigns and crafted a tale that featured the return of fan favorite Hannibal Chau and showed what happened between the two films in Pacific Rim Aftermath. 

At the same time Cavan and writer Zhang Ran and artist BigN teamed for Pacific Rim: Amara, which depicted the backstory of one of the new characters from Uprising in an anime style. 

Last month, Pacific Rim: Blackout allowed readers to revisit the world of Netflix’s Original Anime Series Pacific Rim: The Black in an all-new prequel adventure by Cavan Scott and  artist Nelson Dániel and featuring fan-favorite character Herc Hansen. The PPDC Ranger returns as a world-weary jaeger pilot dragged into battle as an influx of kaiju threatens to destroy the Australian continent and all its inhabitants. Along with his niece Olivia, his copilot Cooper, and Marshal Rask, Herc faces brand-new kaiju of epic proportions while battling his own inner demons.

And, now for the first time ever, Legendary Comics brings together all the Pacific Rim graphic novels in one oversized 568-page hardcover collection that showcases the vast array of the Pacific Rim universe.

Pacific Rim: Ultimate Omnibus is now available at: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Indie Bound, and comic shops.

Graphic Policy’s Top Comic Picks this Week!

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4001-XO_001_COVER-A_CAFUWednesdays are new comic book day! Each week hundreds of comics are released, and that can be pretty daunting to go over and choose what to buy. That’s where we come in!

We’re bringing back something we haven’t done for a while, what the team thinks. Our contributors are choosing up to five books each week and why they’re choosing the books.

Find out what folks think below, and what comics you should be looking out for this Wednesday.

Alex

Top Pick: A&A: The Adventures Of Archer And Armstrong #3 (Valiant) – This series is such a blast to read. I absolutely love how much fun it is, and yet there’s also a message underneath the booze jokes. I’ve loved every page thus far.

Ninjak #15 (Valiant) – What happens when you take everything from one of the most deadly men in England? Well, I assume he’ll want revenge of some kind…

4001 A.D. X-O Manowar #1 (Valiant) – It’s a full Valiant week this week, eh? I’ve been looking forward to 4001 A.D. for a couple of months, and I’m ready to devour all of the tie-ins as well.

 

Paul

Top Pick: All-New X-Men #9 (Marvel) – This has been a fun book and I’m really enjoying seeing these younger X-Men venture out into their new world, experiencing their new present and learning more about themselves.  This issue has the team jump into the Apocalypse Wars and Evan himself will come face to face with the villain many fear he will become.  I’m looking forward to seeing if he can write his own destiny, or is set in stone…and his genetics.

Guardians of the Galaxy #8 (Marvel) – Jaunting through space; helping those who need it; and the ever loving blue eyed Thing among their ranks, the Guardians of the Galaxy is a fun, exciting read I look forward to.  This issue has Groot and Venom facing off against Skrulls.  Lots and lots of Skrulls.  See? Fun!

Vision #7 (Marvel) – A new story arc starts for Vision.  This issue is described as a story about Vision and Scarlet Witch 45 years in the making, and it does not sound like a story book romance.  This has been a great book, showing the dark side to Vision’s idea of a normal family life.  Throw in Scarlet Witch and this is a story I’m ready to dive into.

 

Mr. H

Top Pick: Action Comics #52 (DC Comics) – Past meets present and future as Superman meets Superman! Been waiting for this one a long time and rumors abound what will happen to the current Man of Steel are rampant. Apparently Superman’s greatest foe is not Lex Luthor, Doomsday or Metallo. It’s time. The bell tolls for thee.

Batman #52 (DC Comics) – Last issue before the new direction. A presence from Bruce Wayne’s past comes back to haunt him. While that’s not entirely new, hopefully we get some more insight to his new 52 roots. Last stop before some dramatic changes to the Bat-Universe.

 

Brett

Top Pick: The Fix #2 (Image Comics) – I love a good cop drama, and especially crooked cop drama. The first issue by Nick Spencer and Steve Lieber absolutely blew me away and is easily one of the best debuts of 2016. I’ve been counting down the days until the second issue, thankfully it’s here. The humor is amazing and mixed with the story itself, it’s just a damn near perfect combo.

American Monster #3 (Aftershock Comics) – Brian Azzarello, nuff said. He’s one of the few writers that I’ll devour whatever he writes. It’s not all perfect, but it’s at least interesting.

Grizzly Shark #2: Grizzly Shark Returns (Image Comics) – The concept is as bizarre as the title. The first issue had me laughing through almost the entire thing. It’s absolutely hilarious in a completely absurd way.

Pacific Rim: Tales From the Drift #4 (Legendary) – Big robots and Kaiju. I’m a huge fan of anything Pacific Rim and its been a bit of a break between the last issue and this one, but I’m sold no matter the wait.

Southern Bastards #14 (Image Comics) – One of the best comics on the market is back for a new arc. Always a must read.

Review: Pacific Rim: Tales from the Drift #1

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If you’ve spoken to me in person, seen even a glimpse of my social media presence, or followed me on my journey through the Godzilla in Hell series, you know that the kaiju genre is one of my favorite things. I was first in line on opening day for Pacific Rim, and this series is something I’ve been hoping for since we found out ages ago that Guillermo del Toro planned to continue developing the franchise between films. The Tales from Year Zero collection is still safely shrink-wrapped in my room, carefully guarded by my twenty-something kaiju figures, and now at long last I have a copy of Tales from the Drift to kick off my next series of kaiju-related comic book reviews. So, how does Tales hold up compared to the decades-long history of kaiju stories that have come before it? Let’s find out.

Travis Beacham wrote the screenplay for Pacific Rim, as well as the Tales from Year Zero prequel, and he returns to write Tales from the Drift joined by Joshua Hale Fialkov and cements his position as the man who makes this world work. Marcos Marz and Marcelo Maiolo provide illustrations and color, respectively, creating a gorgeous world of massive jaegers and hulking kaiju. Both kaiju and jaegers are drawn with bold lines and bright, solid backgrounds to make them really stand out, making for dynamic and easy to follow fight scenes. In the early stages of the series it isn’t entirely clear where the focus lies – we don’t know much about the human pilots we’re seeing aside from they met when one of the first kaiju exited the Breach and attacked a submarine, and now they’re a married couple taking on alien monsters together. Many kaiju stories leave the humans as relatively undeveloped characters, basic ciphers that hit the plot points they’re required to hit so the story can progress and we can get back to kaiju action, but in these early stages I’m not sure which way Tales is going to go. The first issue opens with an introduction to the married couple who pilot Tacit Ronin, one of the very first jaeger, and spends quite a lot of time on flashbacks explaining how they first met.

The flashbacks are interspersed with present-day monster action but while both timelines are interesting, I found myself wishing the comic would focus on one and stick with it. The problem with exploring a story by alternating timelines is that when in the present day, characters are in danger of drowning, sometimes it’s hard not to think “Do you really have time for a flashback right now?” And then there’s the risk that if the flashbacks don’t make a viewer care about the characters in question, they’ll feel like a waste of time.

At this point, Tales from the Drift is in such an early state that it’s impossible to tell how in-depth it will go when it comes to human character development. Whether we’ll see favorite characters like Mako Mori or Newton Geiszler as the comic progresses is anybody’s guess, given the time jumps we see in the first issue, but the kaiju-versus-robot action is well worth the price of admission and hopefully the human drama will either be just as interesting or mercifully short. Pacific Rim is at its best when a balance between human drama and monster action is found, and if this team can manage that in the comic book series as well then Tales From the Drift will be in great shape.

Story: Travis Beacham, Joshua Hale Fialkov Art: Marcos Maz, Marcelo Maiolo
Story: 7 Art: 9 Overall: 8 Recommendation: Buy

Unboxing: Nerd Block’s November Comic Block

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In April, Nerd Block announced their newest addition to their box offering, Comic Block! Created specifically for comic fans, the first one featured a t-shirt and numerous exclusive variants.

It’s the seventh month, and the question is, can it be as good as the first? Exclusive comics, a t-shirt, and more! It’s a good month, so find out what’s inside.

Check out everything you get in the latest box, and you can sign up now and purchase the next Comic Block.

 

 

 

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