Publisher: IDW Publishing / Lion Forge
Writer(s): Fabian Nicieza, Mike Baron, Barbara Randall Kesel, Marin Pasko, Tom Peyer, Adam Beechen, Mark Bernardin, Adam Freeman
Artist(s): Leonardo Romero, Lucas Werneck, Fabiano Neves
Release Date: 28th October, 2015

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Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson is a Jack of All Trades. His career so far has saw him go back and forth between the octagon cages of the mixed martial arts world, the bargain bins of straight-to-dvd action movies and the squared circle of man’s favourite soap opera professional wrestling. So it was only a matter of time before he became a lycanthrope superhero in a comic book series dedicated to him.

Rampage Jackson: Street Soldier is an anthology featuring self-contained stories where our hero (along with his loyal pooch Adronicus) travels the world, time and space battling monsters, scientists, clones and other forms of evil foolish enough to raise its ugly head with Rampage around. Sounds incredible, right? Well I wouldn’t get your hopes up just yet, because this is underwhelming – even for a comic dedicated to an aging fighter.

While there is nothing fundamentally wrong with Street Soldier, there isn’t a lot to feel excited about either. Gone are the character traits of what makes the man so entertaining in real life, and so tame is the storytelling that it fails to disguise the blandness of the protagonist. Rampage is famous for his unfiltered wit; here he has absolutely nothing resembling wit at all. Reading it, I felt like I was watching a Saturday morning cartoon aimed at kids as opposed to “the bold new era of superhero fun’’ that was promised to me in the official synopsis. While there is some mild ‘’superhero fun’’ to be found in a couple of stories, I wouldn’t call any of them ‘’bold’’.

However, what Street Soldier does have going for it is the artwork. Illustrated by Leonardo Romero (Batman ‘66), Lucas Werneck and Fabiano Neves (Army of Darkness), their contributions make up for the colour and energy the writing lacks. There is some enjoyment to be found in seeing a wolfish Rampage punch aliens, but ultimately the inability to give the character any significance beyond being that of a tool to tell a throwaway story is what prevents this from being as good as it could have been.

Overall, a great idea with mediocre execution. With the talent on board here, I expected better results. While there’s nothing inherently bad about Street Soldier, it does feel like a waste of a great concept. If you decide to pick it up, I recommend reading it sporadically for some light fluff – otherwise you might feel the burnout rather quickly. The term ‘’toilet reading’’ applies here.

Rating: 2/5.

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The writer of this piece was: Kieran Fisher
Kieran Tweets from @HairEverywhere_.

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