"Dan Dare" (Collector's Edition / Oversized UK Hardcover) by Garth Ennis & Gary Erskine

This volume collects the first three issues of Virgin Comics' Dan Dare revival, written by Preacher scribe Garth Ennis, in which an older Dan Dare is brought out of retirement to help defend Earth from a reappearance of his arch-nemesis, the Mekon. In this respect it seems primarily aimed at long-term Dare fans, as many of the early character reveals and past references are near meaningless (I only understood some thanks to Ennis' introduction, while others surely passed me by).

The book's quality is disappointingly mixed in just about every respect: Ennis attempts to mix obvious commentary on our current political situation with pro-British high adventure (not a comfortable pairing), while Erskine's art is variable -- some panels are great, but often his proportions are off and it's occasionally tricky to follow who's who from frame to frame. It's helped by Parasuraman A.'s colours though, which are suitably modern. Also, despite being a British hero, from a British author, launched by an originally British company, at the behest of its British founder/owner (Branson is even quoted on the cover), the book still has irritating displays of Americanism -- mainly in the spelling ("color", for example). Hardly a major point, but it annoyed me.

This particular collection is mainly a promotional tool, I feel, as it only contains the first three issues of the new miniseries, albeit in a nice oversized hardback format. Somehow I doubt there'll be another matching volume to round out the series, especially as it would be almost twice as long (four issues remain, and one is double-length), so if I want to know what happens I'll either have to track down the remaining issues individually or buy the inevitable complete collection. At this point, I'm undecided.