You’ve never seen Hannah Washington like this… and when you see what her foes look like, you might be glad. Your Major Spoilers review of Ant #2 from Image Comics awaits!

ANT #2

Writer: Erik Larsen
Artist: Erik Larsen
Colorist: Erik Larsen
Letterer: Jack Morelli
Editor: Josh Eichhorn
Publisher: Image Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: February 2, 2022

Previously in Ant: Young Hannah Washington is recruited by the United States government and sent behind enemy lines to contend with murderous zealots hellbent on destroying America!

ANTPOCALYPSE

Ant #2 begins with several interlocking sequences, as we see Ant in action, followed by young Hannah in a straitjacket while the military tries to unlock her abilities, followed by a dream of high school. It’s not 100% clear which is real and which is not, but one track ends with her going to prison for killing men who would have assaulted her, while another sets her free in an unnamed city full of stock terrorists. (Some of them look like they’re straight out of the pages of Holy Terror.) The battle goes well for Ant, but when she is hit from behind, she goes into overdrive, apparently killing everyone in the entire city in a burst of rage. Then, suddenly, she collapses, having been “shut off” by her handler (codenamed The Gadgets Man), who is horrified to see her turned into a living weapon.

TURNED INTO A WAR MACHINE!

My first thought upon reading Ant #2 was how well Larsen had adjusted his art style for this different character, giving a much starker and less shaded look than his work on Savage Dragon. Hannah especially looks unlike any of Erik’s usual female characters, more resembling how she looked in her previous volumes under creator Mario Gully. That’s impressive enough, but the combat sequence is even more so – a symphony of bloody violence that is at once impressive in its storytelling and utterly distressing to witness. Larsen’s story is less successful, overlapping dream, hallucination, and possible government programming into a mishmash of switching perspectives, then launching into a full-fledged massacre by our protagonist.

BOTTOM LINE: IT’S CONFUSING, BUT VISUALLY PLEASANT

There’s a lot going on in Ant #2, and not all of it is conveyed clearly, leaving me confused throughout a good portion of the book, all the while enjoying Larsen’s experimental visuals and hating the things they depict, leaving the book with a right-down-the-middle 2.5 out of 5 stars overall. If these overlapping stories are just an attempt to explain the different realities of the first two volumes of Ant, out-of-print comics more than a decade-and-a-half old, I’m at once impressed with Erik’s attention to detail and uncharacteristically wishing it had been a clean reboot. I’ll be watching this book to see what happens down the line, though.

---

Dear Spoilerite,

At Major Spoilers, we strive to create original content that you find interesting and entertaining. Producing, writing, recording, editing, and researching requires significant resources. We pay writers, podcast hosts, and other staff members who work tirelessly to provide you with insights into the comic book, gaming, and pop culture industries. Help us keep MajorSpoilers.com strong. Become a Patron (and our superhero) today.

ANT #2

47%

47%

This Has Potential

There's a lot going on here that I don't understand, even having read and enjoyed the previous issue, and the overlapping "realities" just don't work. Even so, it's interesting to see Larsen exploring a new art style, even if it's not alway successful.

• Writing

  4
• Art

  5
• Coloring

  5
• User Ratings (0 Votes)
  0