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A review by thebiparadox
Saga, Vol. 2 by Brian K. Vaughan
adventurous
dark
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
4.0
Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staple's Saga, Vol. 2 picks up immediately where the first volume off. Star-crossed parents Marko and Alana are confronted by Marko's parents Barr and Klara, who had no idea that their Wreath son had married one of their mortal enemies, a Landfall soldier. Things quickly devolve when Klara accidentally banishes their babysitter Izabel, and Marko and Klara have to go fetch her from an unstable planetoid, leaving Barr and Alana in an awkward tête-à-tête. Meanwhile, The Will, still in mourning for his ex-girlfriend The Stalk, is recruited by Gwendolyn, Marko's ex-fiancée, to track down the two lovers.
This second installment of the Saga series doesn't miss a beat on its relentless pacing, weaving together action packed storylines and hard-hitting emotional beats effortlessly into a genre-bending chronicle of Marko and Alana's daughter's childhood as an interspecies child in the middle of a never-ending galactic war. She's still just a baby in this volume, but it's easy to see why the grown-up narrator Hazel would tell us this story that she couldn't possibly remember. An infancy as chaotic and dangerous as Hazel has leaves its mark in numerous intangible and tangible ways: from the trauma of feeling your parent's fear and stress as they run from numerous enemies on both sides who don't want to acknowledge the existence of their relationship to the gorgeously designed clothes made by a grandfather who she might never meet. We also get some flashbacks into how Marko and Alana met in a Landfall prison camp—he as a captive and she as a guard—and how their relationship evolved into the deep love we saw in the first novel. And as always, Staples' images completely transcend the plot, creating character depth and world building that complements Vaughan's writing beautifully. It's a fully realized galaxy full of strange species and complex politics and these characters who just want to survive in it.
This second installment of the Saga series doesn't miss a beat on its relentless pacing, weaving together action packed storylines and hard-hitting emotional beats effortlessly into a genre-bending chronicle of Marko and Alana's daughter's childhood as an interspecies child in the middle of a never-ending galactic war. She's still just a baby in this volume, but it's easy to see why the grown-up narrator Hazel would tell us this story that she couldn't possibly remember. An infancy as chaotic and dangerous as Hazel has leaves its mark in numerous intangible and tangible ways: from the trauma of feeling your parent's fear and stress as they run from numerous enemies on both sides who don't want to acknowledge the existence of their relationship to the gorgeously designed clothes made by a grandfather who she might never meet. We also get some flashbacks into how Marko and Alana met in a Landfall prison camp—he as a captive and she as a guard—and how their relationship evolved into the deep love we saw in the first novel. And as always, Staples' images completely transcend the plot, creating character depth and world building that complements Vaughan's writing beautifully. It's a fully realized galaxy full of strange species and complex politics and these characters who just want to survive in it.