Riddle of the Beast

With a generous helping of the plot of Lord of The Rings, Alan Grant takes us on a journey of swords and fantasy in Riddle of the Beast. Painted by several artists, we follow several DC heroes and villains in the fantasy setting. Robin is our hero, who must gather a group to fight a Great Beast intent on taking over Middle Earth... I mean, their homeland. He gathers many such as the stand-by Batman, Wonder Woman, and Superman, as well as others. The story is pretty good. It's not great, again due to its seemingly heavy borrowing, but it's still fun to read. The art... the art, as mentioned, is by several painters. Some are better than others. The biggest problem isn't the change in style from page to page, but certain artists make the action very difficult to see, so you can only follow it via dialogue, because the art just isn't clear enough. This probably deserves 3.5 stars, due to the art, but I am feeling generous and I genuinely enjoyed the story.

Riding on the hype and legendary "Lord of the Rings" resurgence, I was skeptical about purchasing this book, thinking that it may be a quick exploitive means to cash in on the fantasy regrowth. While this book has many of the recurring fantasy themes found else where, the contributors to this graphic novel have produced a fun, can't-put-it down comic.The story centers around the person Robin Drake as he journeys to warn the other inhabits on "earth" of the return of the Beast, a villian the others thought had died fifteen years ago. Many of the superheros are cleverly introduced and united under the banner of saving the "world." Some heros take more proding than others, which aids in the story telling. It was interesting using Robin as the central character - considering he has always been a sidekick (even on his own, Nightwing has never really broken out of Batman's shadow). This move gives the story more force and gives a "Frodo" of the Lord of the Rings" trilogy feel to the book, without copying the material too much. The formula also works well, so why change a genre that works so well - an unlikely hero, who saves the world.The art is outstanding and many great artist contribute their unquie talents to provide pertinent images as the story progresses. A must for graphiic novel fans, who just want to read a good story, view some great art, and have a nice evening.