Long-long ago was a time when I read a lot of US comics. It was some time around when "Avengers Disassembled" event started in Marvel Comics. In fact, most of the comics I read back then were Marvel, although I did read some from DC Comics and Dark Horse Comics, as well. I think the only comics I read from Image Comics was Spawn. Recently I got my hands on them again and, pushed by nostalgia, tried to read them once more with hope to catch up to current events.
I was utterly disappointed.
Obviously the art in first issues is a bit dated for my current tastes, but it’s still good and it’s not what I have issues with. In fact, I remember clearly, that art itself, including the main character in the title, was what pulled me in. More the art of the later issues, though, but still.
What did not age at all is the story or, rather, narration. It simply sucks. It’s bad. It is boring, disjointed, with a lot of extremely unnecessary points and panels, that do not even expand on the setting or lore of the story. It jumps between sub-plots randomly, with no reason and the jumps are always abrupt.
Do not get me wrong, I know, that sometimes that is necessary, when you have several sub-plots or events and you can only focus on one of the at a time. But it’s not Boku No Hero Academia, where last 30 or so chapters jump all-over like crazy. In Academia, even though it makes the story hard to follow, it makes sense because of the events actually going on in the story: they have huge scale with a lot of things going on at the same time.
Spawn is not like that. I do not remember it ever having something that grand, that would require straight/rough cuts between sub-plots or just places. It had some "scale", yes, but it still involved mainly Spawn himself. So the transitions could have been done much better.
But even that would not solve the issue of boring story and characters. They are flat. Predictable. Stupid. Repetitive. Non-developing. I understand why I could dig it when I was a teen, but now… I was barely able to read 15 issues. Perhaps I’ve read/watched too many good storied by now.
