Hunters: The Shadowlands

Earth’s last hope of defense just became lost to the Shadowlands.  When the Hunters, Sela, Roman, Elijah, Masumi and Liesel, stop the minions of darkness from bringing forth a new evil upon the world, they are inadvertently sucked into the Shadowlands.  Now the Hunters must face new dangers and atrocities as they battle their way towards the very thing they were trying to stop on Earth, as well as their way back home.  Written by the talented Raven Gregory and Pat Shand, this tie-in to the Unleashed event from Zenescope Shows the trials and tribulations that Sela and crew undergo in order to put an end The Being.

Hunters: The Shadowlands, was a great thrill-ride from beginning to end.  Just when you think our heroes were in the clear, some new horror pops out to give them a run for their money.  Continuing on from issue 0 of Unleashed, Sela and the other Hunters find themselves in the Shadowlands, where none of them are safe and everything is after them.  Unbeknownst to them, however, Roman had actually arrived several years earlier, due to an uneven timestream between Earth and the Shadowlands.  When the Hunters finally meet-up with Roman, they find that his time in the Shadowlands has changed him and not necessarily to be more helpful.  When all is said and done, they discover that what they had originally been trying to stop on Earth is still at large in the Shadowlands and they must stop it here at all costs.  The action never seems to stop in this book as we find the Hunters in fight after fight on their way to the Being. 

So, yes I did enjoy this trade.  Raven and Pat know what they’re doing and they’ve brought us a cool, action-packed read.  However, it’s not just the action, they give the Hunters some introspection throughout the series and really show what drives them to fight these monstrosities.  I won’t reveal what those are, but they shine a new light, or maybe one that was already there, on who these characters really are.  The art direction wasn’t bad.  If you’ve been reading my reviews right along, you should know my feelings towards the multiple artists per issue, so I won’t go into that.  However, the artists all had similar enough styles that you couldn’t really tell where the story had changed hands unless you really followed any of them.  It is a cool side-story to the Unleashed series, showing what the Hunters had to deal with while in the Shadowlands.  If you like wholesale monster slaughter, then this is definitely the one for you.

The negatives will forever be the art side of things, until its one artist per issue.  Aside from that, I couldn’t find anything I didn’t like.  Between Raven and Pat, you really can’t go wrong story-wise.  What happens in this series will have repercussions down the line as new relationships are formed and old grudges rekindled.  I like the direction these characters are going in and look forward to seeing how this all plays out.

Hunters: The Shadowlands, is a great read for anyone wanting to delve deeper into the Unleashed event, or even if you just want to see monster death.  The Hunters are in for the fight of their lives and if they can’t get back, it may be the only thing they do.  So, go pick up this great trade paper back and witness a battle of hellish proportions, or something close enough to it.  If she doesn’t make it out, Sela would want her story told.  For more info on where to find this trade, visit the Zenescope website, or the Zenescope Facebook page.  

Geek-o-Rama received a copy of this book for the purpose of this review. All thoughts, comments and opinions are those of the individual reviewer.