Disney Villains: Scar #3 // Review
The queen of the hyenas addresses her subjects. It’s been ages since any of them have eaten. One among them must be chosen. She consults the bones...and the bones choose Shenzi. She might have some special divine power of clairvoyance through bone...or maybe it’s just politics. In any case, things are about to get ugly in Disney Villains: Scar #3. Writer Chuck Brown poses a simple conflict between villains in an issue that is rendered for the page by artist Trevor Fraley. Chiara Di Francia handles the colors in a very straightforward dive into traditional villainy for the comics page.
So Shenzi is chosen to be the victim. There’s a good chance that he would be dead, but he’s got a bit of good luck on his side: the would-be kind lion Scar needs him. It’s a very sudden reversal of fortunes for Shenzi, but it might not be exactly what he would hope for: he still has to deal with Scar...one of the most vicious villains in any Disney feature, who finds himself slumming it on the indie comics page once more as he works his way through a meticulous journey around the edges of The Lion King.
Brown continues his prequel to The Lion King with a sharply balanced political drama that still manages to feel simple enough to remain primal and true to the spirit of the original movie. The hyenas always seemed more interesting than the original movie allowed them to be. It’s nice to see them as major players in a lead-in to the beloved movie, but Scar continues to feel a little generic as a villain in a perfectly respectable narrative that doesn’t seem to be aspiring to a whole lot beyond a simple political drama.
Fraley maintains a very faithful rendering of the world of Lion King. The look is so strikingly true to form that it’s impossible to read Scar’s dialogue and not hear the distinct sound of the villain’s original voice actor Jeremy Irons. There IS a certain amount of sketchiness to the action that feels like a lower-res version of the clean and primal lines of the original movie. The lack of simplicity in form and panel composition is mitigated a bit by the work of colorist Chiara Di Francia, who bathes it all in a very clear depth.
Once again--it IS nice to see a style of visual that attempts to take an old, traditionally animated movie and bring it forward to the comics page with some sense of darkness. The old classic Disney film had such a prominent style that any deviation from it will seem like a massive change in the visual reality of The Lion King. In any case...doing justice to The Lion King is an unenviable task. Lean too far in a direction that takes no chances, and it comes across as a pointless piece of artistic product. Lean too far away from it, and it’s going to feel like it doesn't do justice to the original. The creative team of Scar is doing an admirable job in light of this.
