(No Spoilers)

I have never read an issue of Northlanders.  It is a series I’ve heard alot of good things
about but just have never gotten around to reading it.  This issue was given to me because I like
Brian Wood and Fiona Staples.  Plus, even
though it’s #29 in the Northlanders series, it’s a one-shot so it can be read
as a stand-alone.

I’ve been really enjoying Wood’s work over in Wildstorm’s
Dv8: Gods and Monsters mini-series so I was eager to see what he’s been doing
in this series.  The overall tone I got
as I read this was like that of the old EC Comics.  EC didn’t always focus on horror.  Sometimes they’re books focused on other
stories, like pirates for example, which is what the images here invoked in my
mind.  Here, we’ve dealing with Norseman.

We follow a man named Dag in this story who is using his
boat to ferry around some Norsemen for money. 
He’s a lonely guy who’s just trying to make his life mean
something.  You really feel how pathetic
he is as he shares his inner monologue throughout the issue.  It seems like life has just dealt him a
crappy hand.  His journey is very similar
to the main character in “Tales of the Black Freighter” from Watchmen.  Without spoiling anything, there are several
parts in both stories that mirror each other especially towards the end.

As I mentioned, I love Fiona Staples.  Her art is so clean and crisp.  She knows how to use facial expressions to
convey what the characters are feeling and she’s got the details of everything
down from the ship to the backgrounds. 
Plus, her panel work is so fluid and moves the story along quite nicely.

I’m usually not a fan of period stories in comics but Wood
really made this one enjoyable.  It truly
is a one-shot in that I was able to read and understand it without knowing anything
about the rest of the Northlanders series. 
It was a nice way to showcase this world and I applaud Wood for deciding
to release an issue like this.