Dark Souls seems like it would be a bit of an odd choice for the ol’ comic book adaptation treatment. It’s a series where the narrative is entirely up to player interpretation, and while fans of the series, journalists and other developers can speculate and even agree upon aspects of the story, there’s hardly anything concrete for folks to latch hold on to. So one has to question how exactly would a Dark Souls comic unfold? Could it work? Or is it the video game version of Dark Tower or House of Leaves where the level of adaptation seems impossible? Maybe a comic completely ruins the illusion of Dark Souls and spells out the story for all. There’s just multiple places it could go wrong.
However Dark Souls issue #1 takes on a very smart approach. It creates a new protagonist, a fiery redhead who goes by the name Fira and wears armor that oddly looks like body paint. She journey is completely different from that of the Chosen Undead, the Bearer of the Curse and the Unkindled One. Fira quests to obtain a sacred dagger, for reasons yet to be uncovered.
Fira is also a person haunted by her past. We know she once had a family, she was also a foot soldier in an army. (For Soul’s fans, Fira was most likely once a Warrior of Sunlight). She’s constantly plagued by her memories of the past and so real you can kill them hallucinations of the friends and family she left behind. Fira is also constantly losing her memories, a side effect of being an undead slowly losing her mind.
Fira doesn’t really do a whole lot of dying, and you only see her hollow (corpse rotted) in a brief flashback. Otherwise she’s a beautiful shield bearer off to do some tanking and bashing. She’s also joined by the very shamanistic, very tribal appearing Aldrich, a scryer operating as her guide. It’s difficult to say where this comic falls into the lore, but it almost appears to be a prequel of sorts to the original Dark Souls. Of course given the fact time is so… fluid in Dark Souls Fira’s events could be running concurrent to the game’s story or just before.
I rather enjoyed the plot of the comic. As a Dark Souls fan it made the world feel a little richer and shone a light on some aspects I wouldn’t have gotten to see otherwise. Of course it’s difficult to say how cannon any of it is, but it’s still a nice little treat set in the familiar Soul’s universe.
The artwork is pretty typical high fantasy illustration and painting. That being said it is all very pretty, and it captures well the daunting environments of the Soul’s series. The entire first issue takes place in a crystal cavern, but the pages manage to capture a sense of scale and mythic adventure that fits right into to the Soul’s universe. I did find it a little odd that Fira’s armor was so curvaceous it felt like I was looking at a naked woman despite her being head to toe in plate. Aldrich, her partner, was half naked the entire comic so it didn’t matter for him, and I will say Fira’s appearance is very consistent with fantasy. There’s nothing wrong with curves and a bodacious bod, but it does remove you from the realism a bit, especially in a franchise such as Dark Souls where big, clunky, realistic armor is the main draw.
So the comic’s artwork sits a little bit more true to classic fantasy than it does Dark Souls, but since I grew up a fan of books such as Red Sonja, Shi, Sandman and Conan I very much appreciated it. Both the narrative and illustrations also reminded me of the comics based in the worlds of Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinder. If you were eyeing this book, there’s something here for both fans of classic fantasy and Dark Souls. So far it’s not a bad little addition to the world, and as long as it maintains its focus on Fira’s rather interesting undead “affliction” and her characters interesting past it could turn into a winner.
