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Minder goed dan de 'League'-strips, maar (zeker het tweede deel) deed me wel wat denken aan de Rex Libris-comics. Verwijzingen minder literair, tekstballonnen warriger, personages verdwijnen sneller uit beeld, tempo te gehaast en timing minder in evenwicht. Precies wat je van een spin-off mag verwachten. ( )

This is the Alan Moore equivalent of a big, dumb, CGI action movie. I don't mean that it is literally one of those, since it's not exactly dumb (literary references abound, Moore's prose is authoritative as ever), it's not that big (it is, after all, just a li'l comic), and O'Neill's visuals are approachable and lovely. But the whole thing adds up jerkingly to a total mess. The story is ludicrous and disjointed; the constant allusions and intellectual puns distracting and pointless; the art often impressive in service of no real effect. Like much of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, it's hard to say that this book is about anything. ( )

No rapes! That's a good sign. ( )

Although set in the world of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, these are a spin-off, and feature not the original Nemo, but his daughter, Janni Dakkar, who is now the captain of the Nautilus. In Heart of Ice, she makes an enemy of Ayesha, who is determined to get her revenge and so, bankrolled by Charles Foster Kane, sends a trio of penny dreadful inventor-heroes after Nemo… Who is following a trail left by her father to Antarctica, where she finds a city straight out of Lovecraft. It all comes to a bad end for the villains. And that’s pretty much the appeal of this trilogy: you’re playing spot the references all the time. While some are blindingly obscure – those penny dreadful characters, for example – others are all too obvious. I know Moore has played around in the Cthulhu mythos before, but seriously, who still thinks a Lovecraft mashup is clever? ( )