TW Comic Review: Saltire Invasion, First Superhero of Scotland
By Owen Quinn
Don’t you hate it when one minute, there you are minding your own business, tending your goats and living life in a village in Scotland when a bloody Roman turns up and spoils your day? And then you find that a whole legion of Romans are about to arrive and end your world forever so what are you to do? Call on the other world and bring some kickass super heroes!
That’s the premise of Saltire, Invasion, Scotland’s first superhero comic book written and created by John Ferguson. I could tell you that the art is great (stunning in places), the story is sound and flows well (it does) and I left wanting to see more of this world (I do). But what is it about this story I liked?
Well, it would be easy to say this is Braveheart meets Supernatural, in a way it is, but for me, the sense I got from reading this was a jump in time. It reminds me very much of the days I bought 2000 AD and Eagle and the style and stories in those comics. Full colour helps this no end as I literally stopped to admire some of the images, love a dragon me. Reviewers can kiss ass with the best of them but we don’t do that here at Time Warriors. If it’s crap, we’ll tell you but this isn’t. Saltire is in fact a very cleverly crafted story that draws on the legends of Scotland in a time saw the Roman Empire march across the land and absorb entire civilisations so it’s cool we see a resistance to that plan and an imaginative one at that.
To stop the darkness, they call upon elementals that have watched over Scotland for centuries and I loved the fact we have an entire team, each with their on skills and abilities but are merely the forerunners for the arrival of Saltire himself. I want to see more of these guys, learn how they fit into the mythology and how they function in these testing times. But the nice twist is that the arrival of Saltire is no guarantee of victory. The Romans have numbers on their side and a little something backing them up that nobody saw coming. This I liked a lot and really gave this an epic atmosphere. This is a battle of Gods and demons upon which lies the entire future of Scotland itself. There are some nice historical references thrown in which add to the story and use the old Doctor Who trick of what if the Doctor was behind some historical events? Here it’s the same, why certain things happened but I won’t spoil it for you.
Overall, I’m really impressed with the first Saltire Invasion book and highly recommend it. Now let’s see what happens next.
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