The Good
Director Davis has released the Beta clone and has Luke's wife and baby under his watch. Beta goes out into the world to find the clone camp, to kill them all, and Luke goes off to find his wife.
What a great start to a new story, although it really just is a continuation of the last one. CLONE #6 is the first time that I've felt that this series has legs. It finally feels like it can move beyond this first story. It was something I was pretty worried about from the get-go with CLONE. The world really expands here as the number of writers does as well: David Schulner, Aaron Ginsberg, and Wade McIntyre.
I really like that this is book is quickly becoming much larger. We now know who the Alpha is. We have this cool Beta clone running around, doing Davis' dirty work. This book really opens up, and a lot of what I loved from this issue came from Beta just being a really cool and completely B.A. character. This is the first time we get to see him in action, and he is extremely ruthless and just the villain this book needs.
Awesome action sequence as Alpha and Beta unknowingly cross paths, which leads Alpha (Luke) to tell Beta the location of the clone camp. We get a brief fight, which is Beta firing away while Alpha flees. It really got me excited to see these two eventually really square off. This isn't an action heavy book, and you shouldn't expect it, going in, but when we do get a bit of it, it's some really cool scenes that fit the world this book lives in. It's not over-the-top. They're grounded, fun scenes.
Now comes to the part of every CLONE review where I talk about how awesome Juan Jose Ryp's art is, with Andy Troy on colors. From page one, the reader is treated to an extremely highly detailed scene of Luke running towards a fence. The amount of work Ryp puts into this series, month after month, is amazing. Aside from the immense amount of work in each panel, Ryp's art is fantastic and consistently amazing. He has his own distinct style and he's one of my current favorite working artists. Every page is unique and laid out very well. The panel images never become stagnant or boring.
The Bad
The issue feels different from the others, and most likely that's because it has three writers on it. Now, I'm not sure who did what, but the pacing and tone are a tad different. This feels more like a traditional comic and in a sense, it feels like it lost a small bit of its charm. That being said, it's still pretty brilliant.
I thought the fully tattooed clone, guarding Amelia, was a bit much. It seemed silly, just the idea of he being tattooed head to toe.
The Verdict
If you were to tell me, 8 months ago, that one of my favorite series is about a bunch of dudes that all look the same, but it's written so well that I don't have to go back and check which character is which, I'd tell you that you live in a magic fantasy land and you should be institutionalized. CLONE is awesome, and I really love where it's building to. This is a highly underrated book, and I suggest you go out of your way to find it. It's worth it. The writing and art are always fantastic, and while the addition of new writers led to the overall tone of this book changing, it's still better than most of the other series on the shelves.
Overall, I highly recommend this issue.
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