Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Writer: Rafael Albuquerque, Mike Johnson
Artist: Rafael Albuquerque
Colourist: Rafael Albuquerque
Release date: May 13, 2015
Price: $3.50

The timey-wimey nature of Dark Horse’s ei8ht (unrelated to the 2006 Hindi horror film) is colour-coded: green (past), present (purple), future (blue) and the Meld, a sort of time nexus (light gold? light orange? khandor red highlight?). It’s a clever conceit helping the reader to understand where they are in the story. Even people in ei8ht #4 retain the color from their timeline, no matter where in time they are.

To save his wife Joshua travels from a dystopian future across dimensions to kill not Hitler for some reason, but a Red Baron-type Nazi villain named the Spear (which harkens to the Third Reich’s obsession with the Spear of Destiny). The antagonist captures him in the Meld. Will his allies Nila, Dr. Hamm and Sgt. Collins rescue him in time? Can Nila’s people beat the Spear?

Johnson (who also scripted DC’s Earth 2: World’s End, Supergirl and IDW’s Star Trek) allows people to speak naturally and does more than just move the story along. “A Jewish family named Hamm. My father could never resist a bad joke,” says one character explaining his surname. Of course, since Noah’s son was named Ham, the joke loses some steam.

Albuquerque’s art has some nice panels, especially the flying reptiles. You may remember Albuquerque from DC’s American Vampire series, and Albuquerque has penned a few Batman and Animal Man books too. If there is a minus point to Albuquerque’s artwork, it is the lack of backgrounds, creating a void hard for the discerning eye to completely overlook. However, the movement in the artwork is as dynamic as the figures are sketchy.

Overall it’s a decent time-travel adventure, with some interesting tics (and tocks), elevating ei8ht #4 out of the mundane and into the realm of interesting and notable.

Reviewer: Joe Lovece
Reviews Editor: Steve Hooker