BRZRKR #8
The experiment on Unute has some drastic- but not unforeseen- consequences in BRZRKR #8, by writers Keanu Reeves and Matt Kindt, artist Ron Garney, colorist Bill Crabtree, and letterer Clem Robins. This issue completely changes the story, and it’s a doozy.
Energy explodes outward from Unute’s box, with the military units fleeing tendrils of energy. One of those tendrils hits Diana, and a massive discharge rips away from Unute’s box and into the sky. In the aftermath, Caldwell and Keever investigate, but Unute’s gone. The book slowly answers some questions readers have had since the beginning as Caldwell talks to his superior, and the next phase of the experiment is ready to begin.
Reeves and Kindt drop a game-changer on readers in this one. Like so many issues of the book, the story is mostly told visually, with Garney and Crabtree knocking it out of the park. These two were the perfect team for this book, and this issue is yet another example of why. They’ve done some amazing work with the violence, and that extends to this issue as well. There are no big traditional action scenes, but there’s a lot of action. Garney does an amazing job of laying out the pages and getting across what the script needs him to. Crabtree’s colors are perfectly complementary and do a lot of heavy lifting. This is an amazing-looking book in general, but this story really hinges on the art team nailing every panel. They do that and more.
This issue answers a lot of questions readers may have. It’s astonishing that Kindt and Reeves took the story in this direction. What happens to Unute and what it means for the story, and what comes next is anybody’s guess. Fans are finally clued in on what Caldwell’s been doing and why the government wanted Unute beyond just being a killing machine, and Diana being touched by the power from the explosion is paid off well in the issue.
In some ways, BRZRKR has been a bit predictable. It’s the perfect summer action movie of a comic, but the story has gone in the direction that one would expect of a book about an immortal killing machine. This issue completely jars it off that course, and it’s perfect.
BRZRKR #8 is a tour de force. Reeves, Kindt, Garney, and Crabtree deliver a sumptuous feast of visual storytelling, one that changes the direction of the book entirely and takes it on a new intriguing path. BRZRKR #8 is the turning point, and what a turn it is.
