Comic Review: Halo: Initiation #1

I was pretty excited when I found out about the upcoming Halo: Initiation series from Dark Horse Comics, especially when I found out that the series would focus on Sarah Palmer. A fully-clothed, sensibly-armored woman in comics. You know I have a soft spot for ladies like that.

Halo: Initiation #1 tells the origin story of Sarah Palmer and the Spartan-IV program. Knowing that Brian Reed, one of the writers on Halo 4, was taking the lead, I wasn’t too worried about the story.

So far the dialogue (inner and spoken) is very dramatic…you can hear all the voices in your head as brash, military tones. I don’t know if it’s me being a military brat or having been raised on cheesy action movies, but I like the tone. The story also starts off with an emotional punch, trying to create something heavier than just another action adventure. We’ll see if they succeed as the series progresses.

The art style is just okay. The colors are nice and the aliens look great, but the humans all look slightly deformed in the face. It started to bug me after a while.

Call me a sucker for action-packed stories with tough ladies in the lead, but I really can’t wait for the next issue. The series has me intrigued, and I’m interested to see how they continue to handle Sarah Palmer, who is actually treated as a “soldier,” not a “female soldier.”

Plot

“Before she was a super-soldier defending humanity as part of the Spartan-IV program, Sarah Palmer was an ODST—Orbital Drop Shock Trooper—carrying out the most dangerous missions behind enemy lines!”