Something Epic #3 // Review
He’s sleeping, but he’s still asleep. Danny’s mother is waking him up...but she’s waking him up in a dream. She’s remarkably wise and witty. She takes one look at herself in an Eminem t-shirt and becomes very aware of how young Danny thinks of her as being, even though he had only ever seen her like that when he was two years old. Things continue to dive into the surreal in Something Epic #3. Writer/artist Szymon Kudranski continues his dreamlike walk through reality in another issue that occasionally brushes with some kind of casual inspiration before diving into much deeper thematic territory.
Outside of dreams, Danny’s mother isn’t doing well. She beckons to him in the daylight. She apologizes for not believing him. She recognizes that he’s someone special. He says he’ll forgive her if she just gets better. He’s a kid with a curious relationship with reality, but even he knows on some level that it’s not that easy. So she asks him to tell her about himself...the way he sees himself. He tells her about the symphonies he hears...the paintings he lives and the worlds that exist within him. And then it was over.
And then things get very, very dark. Kudranski’s attempts at the profound only occasionally brush against something other than cliche, which is a bit of a disappointment given how sweeping and epic the dreams of one kid CAN be. There’s real depth in the central event of the third issue of the series. There’s a hell of a lot of emotion wrapped up in it, but Danny’s been so tied up in realms of fantasy and other worlds that it’s difficult to really feel the weight of his mother’s condition. The horror that rests beyond that scene DOES seem to be picking up speed and intensity.
There is a tremendous sense of darkness next to the morose sense of shadowy sadness that dominates so much of the rest of the issue. There are a few moments of almost terrifying beauty in Danny’s dreamscape. Kudranski does a brilliant job of binding some fantastic visuals to the page. The final moment in the dream fuses something gorgeous with something ineffably terrifying without feeling terrifying. It’s weird stuff, and some of the better visual magic tied to the page in the series thus far.
Kudranski is clearly moving towards...something. There’s a clear gravity that’s pulling Danny towards the darkness, which may yet come to dominate a hopefully heroic coming-of-age tale. Though it seems to be trying a little too hard to search for deeper meaning, it’s unquestionably interesting from cover to cover as the series reaches the close of its third issue. It’s like Danny’s mother says: Danny IS someone very special. It will remain to be seen whether or not his story can truly live up to his potential. There are quite a few directions that Kudranski could take in future issues. Given the cliched nature of stories about creativity, very few of the potential paths ahead seem potentially satisfying.
