Jumping-On: Simon Bisley's "13 Coins"

- by Señor Editor, 28 November 2014

In the ‘90s, Simon Bisley was one of the few artists to gain a huge mainstream following despite his art not looking anything like the Lees, Liefelds and McFarlanes that ruled the era. While it was evocative of classics like Frazetta or Corben, Bisley definitely had something very unique going for his style. His art alone made almost every comic he worked on worth buying. That said, I haven’t read a new Bisley comic in years. Until “13 Coins”, his new series out now on Titan Comics.

Cover of #1. Click to enlarge.

John Pozner is an ex-basketball star, whose career ended abruptly a few years ago, after a drug scandal. Now John works at a diner, where his girlfriend is the cook. That's John in the middle, on the image to the left. John's life is about to change in a major way, when he finds out he is the descendant of angels! Actual angels! And he is hunted by the Fallen, a group of powerful dudes who are fallen angels. They have an easy time hunting him, because they've infiltrated the US government and can label anybody a terrorist. Thankfully, John won't be alone in dealing with them. The angels have their men on Earth, too. We soon meet a scarred badass called Samuel Goodwin and the sexy Gwen.

Okay, so the script by Martin Brennan and Michael B. Jackson isn't really anything original (so far!). We've had quite a lot of angels vs fallen angels stories before. But that doesn't really matter. Let me tell you why.

Reason number one is the fact that angels, demons, Hell and Heaven, machine gun shootouts and sword fights are pretty much a perfect thing for Bisley to draw. Just look at this two-page spread from issue #1, showing the fight between the angels and the fallen:

All art on this page is by Simon Bisley, © Titan Comics. Click to enlarge.

Now that looks really good, doesn't it? If you're a Bisley fan you will buy this book without even hearing about the story. There's plenty of beautiful pages and panels in this thing. This story is largely driven by the art, and the art is amazing.

All that said, I don't mean to say that the writing is bad. It's nowhere near bad. The dialogues are good, the comic reads real well, and the characters show potential. It's just that we didn't really get far into the plot yet (there are only two issues available in stores right now), and the story didn't yet get a chance to show us how it's different from other Heaven vs Hell type of comics. There ARE some interesting ideas touched on here, though. In the second issue, Samuel tells John "What if I could explain to you the origin of every evil, every legend, every horror man has ever known... Would you want to know?" I don't know about John, but I think that if the writers deliver on this promise, then it could potentially be really interesting. And it's not the only bit like that... But I don't want to spoil too much.

And if it won't be? Well, then we still have Simon Bisley drawing demons, badasses, angels and people stabbing each other. And hey, Hell apparently exists in this book. Wouldn't it be nice to see Bisley's take on Hell?

We don't yet have any nice pictures of Hell. Here's John having a foreboding vision in #1.

As you can see, Bisley's art is looking really good in "13 Coins". Some of his lines here do seem a little softer than what I'm used to, but there's no mistaking the style. This is a beautiful book and Bisley puts his best foot forward. The script gives him a lot of good things to draw, too. Sexy women (this is a book for adult readers, as there are some graphic sex scenes here), car chases, stabbing and gun fights are all present. Both the quiet scenes and the action scenes look fantastic. 

The art is also helped by the colors by Ryan Brown. Everything is looking crisp, and the color palette matches the tone of the comic perfectly.

LEFT: Samuel shooting a bad guy. RIGHT: Sexy Gwen and her brother investigate a crime scene. Click on each to enlarge.

"13 Coins" is a really good looking comic, and it has the potential to be something really great. Bisley is in top form, and the writing team seems like they may have some aces up their sleeves. This is one of the better looking comics out this fall, and if the story develops nicely, this could be a fantastic read. 

I recommend it, even though if you're a Bisley fan, you probably don't need my recommendation. If you're not a Bisley fan, you are most likely blind.


"13 Coins" #1 and #2 are out now! Go to the 13 Coins website for more info. Are you reading this comic? How do you like it? Let us know in the comments below!

Tagged: comics, Reviews.

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