Kong Of Skull Island #2 - BOOM! Studios

KONG OF SKULL ISLAND No. 2, August 2016

Packed full of titanic struggles between gigantic apes, prehistoric killer fish and razor-sharp clawed devil lizards, all of which are superbly pencilled by Carlos Magno, it is clear from the narrative to Issue Two of “Kong Of Skull Island” just why James Asmus, an author perhaps best “known for his work on “All-New Inhumans”, “Quantum & Woody” [and] “Gambit”, felt that this “chance to jump into and build on the original King Kong’s DNA was too incredible an opportunity to pass up!” It’s certainly clear from this book’s harrowing depiction of a great gorilla fending off an enormous Pachycormidae as it gobbles up shipwrecked survivors that the New Orleans-educated comedian thoroughly enjoyed scripting a storyline where mankind trades “one disaster for [another upon] a savage island of dinosaurs”; even if his plot does disappointingly flounder mid-way through the twenty-two page periodical as it frustratingly, and almost exclusively, focuses upon the heathen nuptials of K’Reti and Usana.

Indeed, for many bibliophiles the Stan Lee Excelsior Award-winner’s tale of the Konga dramatically slugging it out with primordial meat-eating predators, whilst the hapless humans surrounding them can only gaze in awestruck wonder and foolishly pray to their false gods, must genuinely have reminded them of just how impotently small many astonished cinema-goers surely felt when they first watched the crew of the Venture follow an abducted Ann into the monster-infested jungle of Skull Island during Merian C. Cooper’s 1933 “American pre-code disaster film”.

Sadly however, these colossal brutal bouts between the likes of the primitively loyal Tul and beach bound rampaging Carnosaurs eventually give way to an incredibly dialogue-heavy series of 'conversation pieces' which lamentably labour upon K’reti’s well-founded doubts regarding his imminent “theatrical marriage” to a woman whose "self-serving" father is likely to manipulate the tribesmen against him should he go against his wishes. “Already married” to an apparently pregnant Ewata following “a private ceremony months ago”, the most unhappy Prince therefore disappointingly spends the majority of this comic simply flitting from one unaffected person to another, telling them how the enforced “pageantry will not avert [the] catastrophe” of their island’s volcanic eruption and consequently, swiftly sucking all the energy out of what was initially a genuinely pulse-pounding read; “Ha! Ah… Youth. So we’ll have it severed. But you can keep her as your mistress. There are some perks to being king.”

Writer: James Asmus, Illustrator: Carlos Magno, and Colors: Brad Simpson