IT'S NOT `GAME' OVER
Matthew Price has some options for those seeking more fantasy worlds to explore after the end of “Game of Thrones”
The HBO series “Game of Thrones” came to an end this week, but for comic-book readers, there are many more fantasy worlds to explore.
Of course, prose readers still are awaiting George R.R. Martin's completion of his “Song of Ice and Fire” series. But comic-book readers can check out adaptations and prequels through the medium of comics.
“George R.R. Martin's The Game of Thrones: the Comic Book” has 24 comics released in the series. The graphic novels “The Hedge Knight” and “The Sworn Sword” follow Ser Duncan and his squire, Egg, in adventures set
100 years before the time in “Game of Thrones.”
Want to go beyond Westeros?
HBO is in the process of adapting the epic fantasy series “Asunda,” based on the “Niobe” comics by Sebastian A. Jones. In the comics, Niobe Ayutami is an orphaned elf teenager who is also the would-be savior of the land of Asunda.
Other fantasy tales can also be found at the comic shop:
Boom! Studios will bring the modern fantasy “Once and
Future” from writer Kieron Gillen and artist Dan Mora to retail shelves in August.
In the series, retired monster hunter Bridgette McGuire must recruit her unsuspecting grandson Duncan into a battle against a rising evil threatening England.
Also from Boom!, “Coda” features a bard is on a quest to save the soul of his wife. At each step, he must decide how much he's willing to cross his own ethical lines to achieve his desired ends. Written by Simon Spurrier and drawn by Matias Bergara, “Coda” is set after an apocalypse erases nearly all magic from a fantasy world.
From Image Comics, “Monstress” imagines an alternate version of Asia in the early 1900s, as a teenage girl shares a psychic link with a powerful monster. Marjorie Liu is the writer; Sana Takeda the artist for this series, which has three graphic novel releases thus far.
Also from Image comes “Isola,” by Brenden Fletcher and Karl Kerschl, in which the captain of the guard undertakes a journey to save the Queen of Maar.
These and many other fantasy titles can be found on the shelves of local comic book shops.