Reviews

Britannia, Vol. 2: We Who Are About to Die by Juan José Ryp, Peter Milligan, Omaka Schultz

painterz's review against another edition

1.0

Meh. I expected more after all the multi award winning sell out blurb.

ljrinaldi's review against another edition

2.0

I have been reading comic books since I was a child, and I am well past my half century. I have read everything from regular super hero books to what was known as Underground, to just about anything that had pictures and was in a comic book form.

This is all to say I am aware of bloody, fighting comics. Read them as super hero comics. Read them as underground or independent comics. Doesn't mean I have to like them. This book is set in the time of Nero, and involves a detective trying to find out what is killing all the noble children.

There are vestal virgins, and talking statures, and gladiators, and slaves, and you know what? I really didn't care about the any of them.

So, perhaps this book is for you. Perhaps you like fighting and blood, and mysteries of the gods, and emperors. But I never really got into any of this, and when, as another reviewer pointed out, our review copy's last chapter lacked words, it didn't really make a difference.

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.

slowreadswede's review

dark mysterious fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

storyorc's review

dark mysterious fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.5

The god statue coming alive was creepy (though they were painted, not white, in Roman times!) and it was nice to see Rubria under duress. The new female gladiator was welcome too.

HOWEVER, the climactic moral dilemma was decided off-screen! The narrative acts clueless to the injustice it tries to paper over as a happy ending. Specifically,

Elissa, a slave from infancy who has secretly learned Carthaginian sorcery from her supposed homeland, is killing nobles who keep Carthaginian slaves. Nero is planning to blame the Vestal Virgins for the murders, which would ruin Antonius and his family too. However, Elissa relents when our heroes reveal to her that her heritage is actually Roman. They then turn her in to Nero. No debate, no acknowledgement that her cause is still totally valid, no guilt over throwing a lifelong slave under the bus to save the Vestals and family. Sure, murder is not a pleasant method of protesting slavery, but Elissa's sister-slave Achilla, the newest member of the Good Guys, kills a noble trying to rape her on page 2 and she's a hero! But Elissa is just acting out of hate because 'Rome happened to her'. No shit!

Ignoring that complexity leaves all the interesting emotional depth on the table. Instead, they just make a joke about the Vestal Virgins deflowering the hero's teen son and set up the next book.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Rape

booknooknoggin's review

3.0

I missed out on reading the prior volume of this series, and cannot help but wonder if I had read that if I would have gotten more out of this title and enjoyed it more. I mean it does have the right blend of action and history to keep me reading but I didn't really feel for the characters. The art was very interesting such as seeing designs of ancient culture. It was an okay read and I would definitely read more of this series.

brenticus's review

adventurous dark mysterious fast-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

While this didn't excite me quite as much as the first volume, it was still pretty good. It seems to do a better job of setting this up as a series, what with our lovely detectioner actually having something of a life in Rome. The art was still great, the case wasn't as cool as the first but was still fairly interesting, and generally I'm interested to see where this goes.