COMIC BOOK REVIEW: Unity #10

Part of Valiant’s gigantic 18-part Armor Hunters crossover, Unity #10 is the metaphorical lull before the big storm, the short recess before the final act commences. With Unity #10, Matt Kindt downplays the big action scenes, focusing more on the aftermath of last issue’s population-decimating event, and appealing to the human emotion by giving an enemy a tragic history, and of course by Robin-izing a bunch of kids.

The issue opens up with nine pages of robotic grunts and expressions through Wingdings-esque symbols. This is the origin story of Gin-Gr, arguably one of the most powerful members of the Armor Hunters, the sphere-headed space-robot who transformed Mexico into a massive dead zone, effectively destroying a good chunk of Latin America. Kindt attempts to humanize the deadly robo-girl (yes, Gin-Gr, much like “Ginger” is a girl’s name) by showing us the tragedy that befell her family—death by meteor shower. The wordlessness, or rather the indecipherability of their speech, adds another depth of emptiness to her lonely existence as she just floats around in space, full of disbelief. Act 2 turns back to Ninjak and Gilad, Unity’s daring duo. The second act seemed more of a filler, seeing as what happened in here was basically similar to what they did in Issue #9, with Ninjak killing a bunch of Doggy-saurs and saving a group of kids. Again, it seemed like Kindt was really attempting to fill this issue with sadness and feelings of sympathy. Kindt did just that, his method just felt too organic and familiar.

With Stephen Segovia inking over his own pencils, the art felt very coherent. He is able to create characters that are able to express an impressive deal of emotion. A noteworthy example is through Ninjak, a character who doesn’t usually take off his mask. The only way the reader would be able to discern his expression therefore, is through his eyes, and Segovia is really able to deliver in this department.

Milla’s colours don’t do much to further enhance the experience. It either feels muted and dull or overly intense, and there were some really odd colouring choices. The full-page spread depicting an object cruising at insane speeds careening towards earth, set against a bunch of clouds was one of the most unconventionally coloured pages. The clouds seemed kind of greenish in colour, and the sort of light distribution coming from the killer space-bot as it burned up in the atmosphere lacked a certain quality to it. All I’m saying is that I’ve seen better coloured pages that depict similar scenes

Kindt is stomping around neutral grounds with the tenth issue of Unity. While it appears that he may be slowly stripping off the groundwork to whatever it is that the Armor Hunters crossover is building up to, all the creative choices he made in Issue #10 were all safe bets. We were treated with an all-too familiar second act, but were left hanging to introduce a much bigger threat. Gin-Gr’s origin story was poignant, but it isn’t really easy to try to relate to something that just burned the whole of Mexico to a pulp. This feels like a skippable chapter, if you’re only into Unity for the whole part of the Armor Hunters crossover, but not a bad read over-all for regular readers of the comic.