A Review of Sigil Volume 5: Death Match

I believe in my review of Sojourn that I discussed the sad fate of Cross-Gen, a comic book company that went backrupt and was forced to discontinue several of its books despite the fact that their main storylines had not concluded.

Most of their comics took place in the Sigilverse, a universe that took place in diverse timelines, but focused on the Sigil, an odd symbol similar to the Yin/Yang symbol. The Sigil usually played a part in the stories, and I suppose the series that had the most involvement was Sigil, an epic science fiction story. Checker Book Publishing gathered together several issues of Sigil to present the Fifth Trade paperback collection, appropriately subtitled Death Match.

The story of Sigil takes place many centuries in the future as the Planetary Union (humans of the future) have been at war with a Saurian race from the planet Tcharun. The main character is Samandahl "Sam" Rey, a former soldier who discovers the power of the Sigil and becomes more powerful than Superman. Sam's newfound power really turns the tide of the Planetary Union's century-old war, and Volume 5 opens with both sides invading each other's homeworlds.

Sam manages to help stop the damage of the Saurian invasion fleet on the planet of Gaia, and his friends Roiya, JeMerik, and Zanni reek havoc on Tcharun. Sam's friends face a lot of trials, and Sam himself must face-off with Khyradon, a self-proclaimed Sauraian profit. Both Sam and Khyradon battle like twin titans, hence the title Death Match.

You may notice that I am reviewing Volume 5, without reviewing volumes 1-4. I won't get into the reasons for that, but I found that I was able to follow along with it pretty well, as there were constant plot summaries before every issue of the story. However, there were several subplots that I wasn't able to keep up with, such as one about Roiya. Apparently, Roiya had been killed before Sam obtained his powers, but she was downloaded onto a holographic program. Things get only somewhat interesting when the real living Roiya shows up.

I wish I could say that Sigil sucked me in, but that really wasn't the case. I would also have to say that even though the artwork was good, it wasn't necessarily spectacular, which would be required for something as epic as this story. It is always hard to create events in science-fiction stories that are different than sci-fi stories that we've previously seen. Unfortunately, Sigil looks all too familiar with very little novelty and characters that needed a little more development.