First off I'll get this off my chest these books are no where near on the level of brilliance as the first two volumes of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen comic. And basically these three books tell one story. The first book is the weakest by far as it doesn't really do much but set up the next books. I didn't find the story that engaging nor did it do much to set the characters up as engaging either. Out of the mass of things I've read by Alan Moore this is one of is weakest written comics, by far.
The one thing for sure I did take from this book is that as Moore has gotten older he's gotten more perverted on the sexual scale and it doesn't serve any part in the story but for a perverts stand point. Don't get me wrong there were moments like that in the original League but I didn't feel that it overshadowed the story like it does in these three volumes.
I think the one mistake Moore made in this series is not focusing on the character of Orlando. In the final volume he does but by then it is way to late. Orlando is a fascinating character with a rich history that isn't mined at all but is more or less just tossed around in flippant on liners that aren't explored but only washed out to sea forgotten the moment they were written. I think having Orlando, as old as he/she is would have been a great focal point for this story that spans hundreds of years. I really liked the third volume the best as Orlando totally helped to draw me into the story, where as the other volumes lacked this viewpoint.
The one thing these volumes do well is still establish Moore as the total anti-comic writer because he's not afraid to just have two or three people talking about things for pages and have those things have meaning not just people talking about nothing. And he's not afraid to not have action scenes every other page or big splash pages every other page. I've always liked this about him and it's one of the reasons I've always found his comics so interesting. I mean his League is one of the reasons I started collecting comics again but then I found myself in a pickle of not being able to finding anything that would match the caliber of his written word.
As the days have gone by since I read these I've found myself forgetting what they were about as the story just didn't resonate with me like the League did. The League story has stuck with me over the years since I've read it. I also didn't find the level of detail to be as rich and rewarding as it was for the two League volumes, there was just something missing this time around.
Even Kevin O'Neill's artwork didn't have the same passion and detail as it did the first time around. Both the writing and illustration seemed to have suffered from something. I would only recommend these for fans of the first two volumes as they do somewhat continue the story but other than that you're not missing much by skipping them.
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