Review: Silver Surfer by Dan Slott and Michael Allred by BowGaming (haunting Riri 24/7)

[ivory kayak]

Thread for discussing Silver Surfer by Dan Slott and Michael Allred, reviewed by BowGaming (haunting Riri 24/7)!

[obsidian fjord]

@ancient quiver curious to hear your thoughts on my review :)

[ancient quiver]

Very well written! I agree with most of it, Dawn was far and away the highlight of this run. It’s been a while since I’ve read the whole series, but from what we read in bookclub I do agree the stories could definitely have been more mundane and much less special without her, and she is 100% the reason that the surfer has that relatable and human feeling in this run.

Again it’s been a bit since I’ve read past the first arc so you’ve got a fresher read than me, but I have to disagree with the superficialness of the stories. He definitely could have gone deeper, but I still think he handled them well while keeping within the tone he set for the overall series. I only vaguely remember the situations you remember so I can’t reference those specifically, but the ending where ||Dawn dies, and as a tribute the surfer uses her polka dot pattern for the basis of the energy of a universe (and an origin to the Kirby Krackle which, as a giant Kirby fan, was a really fun nod)|| got to me. It’s one of the first comics that ever really tugged at my heartstrings, and to this day is still one of the only comics to make me feel like that and is still one of, if not my favourite, ending to a series.

The Allreds art is phenomenal, no artists could have fit this series better than them. This run made them one of my favourites, so while I have seen other art of theirs that I thought someone could have done better, that wasn’t the case here. They brought a fantastical pop art feeling to the story that the cosmic aspects needed.

Glad to make another person a fan of this series, it deserves all the recognition it can get and in my opinion is one of the best comics ever. I also plan on rereading it one day, just waiting for an omni reprint so I can have my own copy

And I appreciate the ping, thank you! I love talking about this book lol

[obsidian fjord]

Yeah the omni is so expensive! I never buy things I've read on MU but for this one I thought it would be nice, but man not at those prices 😅

[obsidian fjord]

Btw don't get me wrong there are points Slott does really well with the emotional bits, like the very ending, but what I meant more is there are times where he creates a scenario of huge emtional potential, and then just doesn't use it beyond the superficial level. For example, the whole situation with ||Dawn's mom, they just kinda left and it was never really explained why the mom left in the first place or why she wanted Dawn gone now. Nothing was really done with that.|| To a degree, same with the (earlier bits) of the ending. ||Dawn learns she will never be able to see her family again, and she just goes "ah well I get to explore a whole new galaxy so who cares, it's only my twin sister and her recently born baby , and this was right after she risked it all just to say goodbye to her dad one last time....||

So in those cases I think Slott could've done a bit better, gone a little deeper

So yeah specifically anytime Dawn suffers a great loss, Slott just kinda lets it go it seems. The only time he really did anything with it was with Dawn's dad, but even there he mostly just left Dawn in denial

[ancient quiver]

I usually don’t, but I have in the past twice for books I really love and wanted to pick this one up too

[ancient quiver]

I do see your point here, it is kind of true. Like I said it’s been a while since I’ve read the full run, but I do vaguely remember how easily she glossed over everything that happened, especially considering how family oriented she is at the start of the run. And while wanting to go out and explore is one thing, never being able to return is pretty heavy.

I did notice that again even in the first arc to a lesser scale, she handled being abducted and leading a group of aliens on an unknown planet very calmly without hesitating. Even when the surfer came to rescue her she told him to come back so she could help the others first.

Even with her dad it didn’t go too deep into it, which could have been a great side to explore but also I get why he didn’t since that’s not the tone he set for the series. I still wish he did since glossing over it doesn’t make sense but I at least see where he’s coming from in his choices

But yeah I agree it could’ve been handled differently. Either by diving deeper into it or not setting such high emotional stakes and not paying it off

But overall I’d say it wasn’t impactful enough to take away from the story, I still love what he did

[obsidian fjord]

Pretty much this. I get that he didn’t want to go that far and maybe wanted to keep things light, but in that case he probably shouldn’t have created those scenarios. Especially the one with her mom was very avoidable and not that important at all to the bigger story

[obsidian fjord]

Absolutely

[ancient quiver]

There were a lot of them that definitely could have been avoided, but also some that from what I remember, while not handled greatly in and of itself, helped the overall story I’d say

Like while he did glaze over the ||sister and niece|| bits, it did help acknowledge how impactful her life still was in the end, and showed the surfer that every life matters

I did like how it tied into the beginning since Dawn only shows up because she’s “the most important person” to the surfer and that’s exactly what she became, even though at the start it was a stranger he didn’t care for beyond a life worth protecting

[obsidian fjord]

Oh yeah definitely

Same with the ||dad|| stuff, could’ve been handled a bit better but it was important to the bigger story

[ancient quiver]

Yeah exactly