Avatar: The Last Airbender - The Kyoshi Warriors #2 (Dark Horse Comics)

Hello there! Padawan J here, the resident Star Wars expert from the ODPH! This week I'm going to be reviewing the 2nd issue of Avatar: The Last Airbender - The Kyoshi Warriors

The Kiyoshi Warriors are back in action as the focus of the latest mini-series from Dark Horse Comics! After their encounter with the Avatar & Zuko, the Kiyoshi warriors have left their island to help fight the Fire Nation. They’ve been put under the command of General Andal who wants victory at any cost! So just how high is the cost? Let’s jump into it!

Credit: Dark Horse Comis // Avatar: The Last Airbender - The Kyoshi Warriors #2 by Brandon Hoang (Writer), Bellbessa & Misha Gehr & Xanthe Bouma (Art), Adele Matera (Colors), Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt & Tyler Smith (Letters), Dani Weires (Cover)

*** POSSIBLE SPOILER WARNING ***

The Story

Brandon Hoang continues to do incredible job capturing the feeling of the animated series that fans are sure to enjoy. It’s an incredibly satisfying story that continues to do a fantastic job emulating the series in a way that feels straight from the television screen to the comic book pages.

The issue picks up right after the first one ended and with the Kiyoshi warriors on the front lines of the war against the Fire Nation. The General in charge of the force the Kiyoshi warriors has a plan to hit a Fire Nation outpost, but Suki has her doubts. Despite Suki retelling a relevant story involving Avatar Kiyoshi to the General, he doesn’t listen. From there the story plays out about how you’d expect, but that isn’t a bad thing. Again it has that familiar sense that fans will be used to and it works spectacularly.

Every decision the Kiyoshi warriors make in the issue feel natural to their characters and not once feels out of place. The pacing of the story is spectacular and again feels like it’s perfectly paced for a 22 minute episode of the series. There’s twists and turns throughout the issue that will keep you guessing right up to the very end. Speaking of the ending, it too has a familiar feel that will leave you wishing for the next issue right now. It’s going to be interesting to see how this mini-series is wrapped up and perhaps tied into where we first see Suki in season two of the show.

The Artwork

Bellbessa, Misha Gehr, Xanthe Bouma & Adele Matera all do an incredible job with the artwork for this issue that continues to capture the look of the animated series in a way that fans will instantly recognize. The artwork is seriously incredible, and looks like an exactly how the characters look from the animated series. Every single detail of the artwork in the issue feels like it’s straight from a storyboard of the animated series and lends to the overall enjoyability of the series.

Overall Grade: 9/10

Brandon Hoang continues to pen a fantastic story that every fan of Avatar: The Last Airbender is going to enjoy. Exploring a relatively unexplored time in the story together with artwork that is breathtaking in it’s execution of faithfulness to it’s source material make this a home run for fans of the series. This is a series that is a must read series of the year.