#BookReview ‘Kraken’ by Shannon Eric Denton and David Hartman

More monster than man… A unique supernatural historical adventure from the award-winning writer and artist team of Shannon Eric Denton and David Hartman.

Set in a supernatural take of the 1930s, courageous adventurer Kraken returns from a three-year journey in a different dimension in order to stop a mystical Nazi invasion.

From the minds of Oscar-nominated Shannon Eric Denton and Emmy-nominated David Hartman comes an exciting story of a hybrid monster-man and his mission to stop the Nazis from resurrecting ancient horrors upon the world.

After disappearing for three years, esteemed adventurer Kraken returns to reality in search of allies to stop an evil sorceress from unleashing a horde of eldritch monsters on the world. Armed with a pistol and supernatural tentacles, the Kraken is loose!

Set in a reimagined 1930s backdrop and filled with occult powers, hidden artefacts and sentient talking skulls, Kraken fills your appetite for the supernatural unlike any other.

If you’re a fan of supernatural period pieces, and are ready to unleash the Kraken, this is the book for you!

Thanks so much to Titan Comics for my gifted review copy of the complete volume one paperback of ‘Kraken’ which was published in September 25.

It includes variant covers such as one made by Mike Mignola, full page colour illustrations on the quality paper you would expect from Titan, and author/illustrator bios, as well as recommended reading of the ‘if you liked this, you might like…’ variety.

This tale of derring do takes air force pilots, unchartered islands, pirates and …eldritch gods, chucks them through a worm hole and creates this amazing adventure that will hopefully have legs.

Here, Captain Karken, pilot, gets caught up in a rift in space, flies into this supernaturally created hole and does not reappear for another 3 years.

He won’t talk about what he has seen, and battled there, but it is clear from how he wraps his face to resemble Griffin, HG Wells Invisible Man, that he is not the same. What has been done, however, to his body and soul is hard to imagine and is subtly teased at through the book before the grand reveal of what Kraken has become.

He has returned in time to help stop the Nazis experimenting with bringing monsters from their world , to ours and in order to do so, he needs a team of trusty allies to help him.

With a very characteristic body and face shape which reflects the time frame of the 1930’s, I really enjoyed the way that both men, and women as well as monsters were drawn, the lengthy chins and sometimes hard to visualise eyes-excusing the pun-leave the reader to assemble the features by really looking at each storyboarded square.

The story is a cracking adventure with a satisfying pay off, however, it also leads neatly into what will hopefully be ‘Kraken-Vol 2’, as our erstwhile captain is no longer able to just pick up where he left off, there are tales he has to tell of what he saw in the netherworld , but this is not the time for them.

Sometimes, the colouring is too dark to work out what is going on, but this is very rare when you consider the entire book as a whole, and I can overlook it. It slightly detracts , but does not negate the overall effect of the book.

Adventure and righting wrongs against the ultimate villains, to keep the world safe?

Sign me up please for ‘Kraken’s Commandos’!

Shannon Eric Denton is a veteran storyteller and artist with credits at Cartoon Network, Warner Bros., Jerry Bruckheimer Films, NBC, Disney, Sony, ToyBiz, Marvel Entertainment, Fox Kids, Paramount, CBS, Dimension Films, DC Comics and Nickelodeon.

David Hartman is the Director, Illustrator, Producer of Phantasm Ravager, ARK, Trese, Transformer:Prime and many more.