Ivar, Timewalker #12

By Fred Van Lente, Pere Perez, and Andrew Dalhouse.

“Things have their shape in time, not space alone. Some marble blocks have statues within them embedded in their future”
― Dr. Manhattan – Watchmen

The release of Ivar, Timewalker #12 triumphantly signifies a year of artistic and literary awesomeness! If you have failed to read this title you still have time (very little) to do so before Christmas so that you are able to give yourself the gift of wonder via writer Fred Van Lente and artist Pere Perez’s comic book perfection! While completely different in both tone and in scope, Ivar, Timewalker deserves a place next to writer Josh Dysart and artist CAFU’s (Carlos Alberto Fernandez Urbano; it’s a long name) Imperium as BOTH titles are simply the two best titles in the industry today! 120% superior to anything else in comics right now (and I’m not sure that this number is even mathematically possible).

Ivar, Timewalker is Van Lente’s baby. He must have sat down many months ago and created a secret flow-chart outlining the complexities of both time and interdimensional travel (as well as love of course) so that fans and readers alike would be able to fully enjoy this series month after month. This book is the opposite of a mess; it wraps seemingly complicated concepts into the plot and makes them both simple and neat. The result is a masterpiece of a title that deserves a far larger fan-base than it presently does. Stop wasting your life and read this story now!

It has been stated many times before, but Pere Perez is golden on this title! Effortlessly creating the look, emotions, personality, and style for Ivar and Neela (and one else in the Archer & Armstrong mythos). His work is clean, crisp, and correct for the title and face it, Ivar, Timewalker is loaded with a diverse line up of settings, time periods, creatures, and space which Perez tackles with a smooth professional touch. Colorist Andrew Dalhouse is given much to work with, and does not disappoint in any way. The three of these creators together do what is often missed in this industry; they create comic books that look, feel, and read like comic books were meant to look, feel, and read.

If you do one more thing in 2015, it should be reading Ivar, Timewalker #1 through #12. It’s the sort of book that only comes around every couple of years, and is in itself an event that should NOT be missed.