Project Patron #3

Project Patron #3

Aftershock Comics 2021

Written by Steve Orlando

Illustrated by Patrick Piazzalunga

Coloured by Carlos Lopez

Lettered by Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou

Thirty years ago, THE PATRON died, only for the United Nations to replace him with a perfect robotic duplicate. Now, the monster responsible for The Patron’s death has returned, threatening to expose the Project Patron team. But with one of their own dead, is the team strong enough to fight on?

The more we see this book the more intrigued I become. I do like the opening here because it introduces us to another hero in this world, Son of ‘76. Now we only see him for a moment but the impact is much longer lasting, why well because he engages the reader. I remember being six years old and celebrating the country’s 200th Birthday thanks to seeing him in these pages. Now what comes next is where Steve is finding his time to really shine here and that’s thanks to quality of the characterisation we’re seeing. I love the idea that they are finally sitting down to talk about the elephant in the room and it really helps when they open up for the reader to see who they are and what they are about in their own viewpoints. This really is amazingly well done.

I am really rather enjoying the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceedingly well. The character development is phenomenal and this is thanks to the dialogue, the character interaction and how they act and react to the situations and circumstances that they encounter. The pacing is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing more and more of the story we find ourselves captivated by the things we see.

I am pretty impressed with the way we see this being structured and how the layers within the story continue to grow, evolve, strengthen and new emerge as the encounters dictate. It’s here within these layers that we see some massive characterisation some of which works with the main arc and some that just simply add extra depth and complexity to what we see here and both are exquisitely rendered. How we see everything working together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is beautifully achieved.

I think the interiors here are very interesting. There is something unique about how we see the style and that’s a good thing to make your own statement and be your own artist. The linework is strong, confident and with the varying weights being utilised to create the detail work that we see is rather well achieved. I would like to see backgrounds really utilised throughout the book as without them it feels like we are missing something that certain extra which expands the moments. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a nice solid eye for storytelling. The colour work is nicely rendered as well. The various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work leaves a great impact upon the reader.

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I love the idea here and how we are seeing things play out as well as the mystery of who killed Kone still remaining keeps this fresh and interesting. I like that Steve isn’t rushing to reveal a whole lot right away and that he’s letting things take their time as it really should or would in real life. That we see all of this as if it were happening in “real time” allows the reader to see a more natural progression to the story and makes it more relatable to. It also allows the reader to become really engaged in what we see and that makes all the difference in the world. Steve himself has emerged as a prolific writer whose work should be read by all.