Saga, Vol. 2 Paperback – July 2, 2013

SAGA by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples uses their second arc to tell the love story between Alana and Marko, and it actually makes sense! Chapter 7, "Dad grew up on WREATH, a magical moon locked in endless conflict with LANDFALL, the very planet it orbited." So we have the classic Capulet v Montague rivalry, here. "We are small, but the universe is not." Or as Linus Van Pelt once said, "There is no battle too big that I cannot run away from it!" But SAGA is about the trouble you cannot hide from because life refuses to leave lovers alone like that. Chapter 8, "I sometime forget, but mom and dad had lives long before I ever came into the picture. They had dreams that had nothing to do with whether or not I'd grow up to be an acrobat or a brain surgeon. They had their own hopes. They had their own desires. And then, against all odds, they found the perfect person to share everything with." The universality of that statement, even though Marko was Alana's prisoner, cuts through the specificity of SAGA's narrative. If there's no heat between Alana and Marko then what are they running for? (But enough about about Darth and Padma, ahem.) Marko's father Barr says to Alana, "Hazel is fine. She stopped crying the instant I put her into that absurd pile of things you call a crib." Holy Nativity, Batman! But beyond the Biblical allusion, this young family is in a desperate situation. "There is no way that I'm this lucky. My father-in-law is a seamstress?" Costume changes in comic books usually happen because a new artist has come on board, but Fiona Staples realized that going forward Alana needed clothes appropriate for her situation. Chapter 9, "Hiya, Mama Cellulite." This insult slung at a female pimp is the feminine sensibility of this series at its best: no guy would say anything about cellulite before pulling out a gun. Slave girl says, "Thataway." Each chapter of SAGA opens with a splash page and closes with a splash page, this closing has a child pointing directly at us the reader and reminds us that the stakes are always about life and death for all creatures big and small. Chapter 10, "Yeah, dad always had a way with the ladies." Marko's transition from prisoner to love muffin is critical, but Brian K. Vaughan's male protagonists (as in Y: THE LAST MAN) are often the only c*** for miles around, so they don't need to work that hard to get some. Izabel returns in high style, "Yeah, that's right. Flee in terror, bitches!" Fiona Staples has designed alien witches to scatter away that are spooky as hell. Izabel is none too happy with Marko's mom Klara, "You're the old crone who sent me to this dump, aren't you?" Well, yeah, but that afforded Barr precious time to bond with Hazel, for Alana was freaking out, "I was giving Hazel a bath and part of her just... just f****** fell ff. I don't even know what the f*** this is!" Barr explains how his species works to her, yet another clever role-reversal in SAGA where a loving grandfather can give a nervous mother of a newborn invaluable parenting advice. Chapter 11, "Yeah, yeah, so my mom and dad used to have sex." Again, Alana and Marko being intimate drives SAGA forward, it's not the kind of funky doodle Nightwing was doing with Starfire for over a decade where there was no possibility of pregnancy; these two fugitives had a baby while on the run - this is why we're all here, folks. Marko tries justify his trying to knock Alana up but she's not having it, "First of all, we're not free, we're hiding on a f****** rooftop on f****** Cleave." SAGA is gender neutral in that it's the guy who is romanticizing their plight. Klara is trying to do the noble thing when their rocket ship is under attack, "Your father and I have lived rich lives, lives that aren't worth a wet s*** without you!" To his credit, Marko holds his parents in higher regard than cannon fodder, but loss has always been a factor in Brian K. Vaughan's stories and SAGA is no exception as Hazel wistfully explains, "I still have a scrap of the outfit he made for me." Chapter 12, we are on the battlefield where one of bounty hunters is saved by an ill-fated medic, "Wait... am I dying? Am I gonna..." BAM. That same hunter tracks down a lead for the fugitive family not yet realizing that, "We'd already been there a week," Unlike the first three episodes of Star Wars where everything we learn about the Force and the Empire feels forced and unpersuasive, this second arc of SAGA brings three generations together organically while putting the dangers at a slightly lower boil without sacrificing a sense of urgency. SAGA takes the time to blink its eyes, to breathe deeply, and to let its concepts cool down a touch. SAGA does not let its mythology choke out its humanity. STAR WARS took 3 movies to tell us about Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader: The Early Years, and it was too academic, too much spectacle and too little emotion to matter. SAGA never fails to be emotional: Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples gracefully bring deep feeling into every science-fiction scenario :D

In a mere twelve issues' worth of run SAGA has established itself as possibly the best comic book currently going. For my money, it's SAGA or it's FABLES or it's HAWKEYE ruling the roost. Brian K. Vaughan has taken his love of Star Wars and of parenting and crafted this sublime four-color synthesis. SAGA is an instant classic, a sweeping space opera. There's an intergalactic alien war fought by proxy and a Robot Kingdom inhabited by folks with television heads and magical moon people and also one of the most relatable love stories we've ever read in a comic book. I've read Vaughan's EX-MACHINA and Y: THE LAST MAN and RUNAWAYS. SAGA makes a bid to be the best of that lot.Who knows when this takes place. Either a long, long time ago or in the far-flung future. Doesn't matter. The backdrop goes like so: In some distant galaxy a moon called Wreath is locked in endless combat with the planet it orbits, called Landfall. But hold up. Because direct conflict would result in the destruction of both worlds, their war is outsourced to other worlds. Those who inhabit Wreath wield magic. Them what lives on Landfall access highly advanced technology. Their list of differences goes on and on.Maybe one sad day I'll crack open an issue of SAGA and it'll suck. But that's not right now and won't be for a while, if you go by Vaughan's exemplary track record. His storytelling is consistently compelling on an emotional level. I absolutely love our two lead characters, Marko and Alana, from their passionate embraces to their post-coital chit-chats. Vaughan writes them so real and believable, never mind that he's got horns and she's got wings. He's from Wreath, a pacifist with a buried nasty streak. She's a former PFC (Private 1st Class) from Landfall. Somehow, they fell in love and ran away and got married. And, on a mudball called Cleave, when they had a baby, suddenly the worlds of Wreath and Landfall are dispatching bounty hunters and freelance assassins after them. It's not a spoiler to mention that the baby, Hazel, survives. After all, she's the one slyly narrating her parents' story from somewhen in the future.SAGA Vol. 2 collects issues #7-12. We catch up to Marko, Alana, and Hazel in their living rocketship tree, just in time for Alana to meet her in-laws. Before someone can say "Um, awkward," Marko and his mom whisk themselves away on a rescue mission to retrieve Hazel's dismembered ghostly babysitter, Izabel, her what's been inadvertently banished. This leaves Alana and her father-in-law on the living rocketship, trying to find common ground.Elsewhere, that unstoppable contract killer, The Will, keeps ingratiating himself to the reader. But having the awesome Lying Cat as a sidekick and rescuing a six-year-old girl from a life of sex slavery will get a dead-eyed anti-hero the benefit of the doubt. The Will expands his company by one as Gwendolyn enters the picture. She's an agent of the Wreath High Command. She's also Marko's rebuffed ex-fiancée. We watch as she chastises The Will for not being more gung-ho about his pursuit of Marko, Alana, and Hazel. But right now, he's all about rescuing that six-year-old.An aside: I don't know how the Lying Cat so easily wins hearts left and right just by saying the same hilarious one word, and this infrequently. She's right up there with Oberon from The Iron Druid Chronicles and Bernie Kosar from I AM NUMBER FOUR.So, yeah, Volume 2 showcases two dysfunctional families, one on the run, the other on the chase. And is it wrong that I'm also sort of rooting for The Will and company, even though they'd happily murder our protagonists?There are also flashback sequences that detail how Alana and Marko met and fell for each other. Also, there's a book.Here's the bit where I drool all over Fiona Staples' art. I've lauded the hell out of Vaughan's storytelling: his creativity and fantastic humor and a knack for gut-punching you emotionally and character interplay that's nothing if not note-perfect. Fiona Staples has stepped her game up to the extent that she matches what Vaughan is bringing to the table. Staples is amazing and, like Vaughan, fearless. She embraces the challenges Vaughan presents her with. She realizes his offbeat, sometimes dark concepts so convincingly in panels of vivid imagery that she'd penciled and inked and colored and, those times when Hazel feels like narrating, hand-scribbled. There's a scene of Marko and Alana having sex, and other artists probably would've ruined this scene, made it too salacious. In Staples' hands, this passionate interlude comes off as racy, yes, and graphic, yes, but also real on an emotional level. Her cover for issue #8 has to be the frontrunner as my favorite comic book cover of 2013.Unexpected as the new normal. A guy with a television for a head perched on the toilet. Assassins with interesting names like The Stalk or The March or The Will. A planetoid that's expecting. A cool-ass (but very dead) babysitter whose guts hang out like wet party streamers. An exotic moony language that sounds suspiciously like Esperanto. Big laughs. Sad tears. A steadfast romance. Surges of excitement. That persistent thrill of contentment. Explicit tag. Writing. Drawing. Resonating. Top of the pull list. Is Saga.

4.25 stars. Simply put there is no stronger series out there for adults TIRED of generic capes & spandex. This series was made for a well done live action series.

That’s how I’d describe Saga to anyone who asked me about it. I’d also quickly add that it’s enjoyable and quite a quick read. Like the best science fiction, Vaughan’s story keenly reflects common truths about family, relationships, exploitation, conflicting loyalties, and other themes not limited to intergalactic conflicts between alien species. On to Volume Three…

I get that these are actually part of the series and are part of the cohesive whole. But jumping between different character, timelines or fantasies/dreams seems a little random and hard to follow. I think it would be better if it got a bit prolonged. Less jumping.On the other hand, I'm sad to see Barr go so soon. I was starting to really like him. He mellows out his wife because she seems a bit brash.I do want to know what happens to them on Quietus and how come they still haven't contacted the author, isn't that the reason Alana chose that planet?Or, or maybe they did. And that last photo is of them hiding in his attic, or basement or somewhere. I bet that's what it is.

Star-crossed lovers Marko and Alana and their baby Hazel are still on the run in Saga, Volume 2. In this volume, we also get a chance to get to know Marko's parents and of course there is a lot of action going since Marko and Alana are still being hunted across the universe.It has actually taken me quite a long time to read this volume. I bought it last summer and I have just dragged out reading it since I knew that as soon as I read it would I want the next volume to read. And, I have been trying to be frugal so it has been sitting on a shelf for a long time. Also, quite a lot of books have come between, I have a tendency to read more on my iPad than the books I buy...How was the volume? I can honestly say that this is one of the best series I have ever read when it comes to graphic novels. The art and the story both rocks my socks. It's science fiction, with adventure and romance, strange creature and sweet moments. And, it totally surprising and absolutely nothing that children should read. I mean there are some pretty graphic images in the volume so letting this one or any of the other volumes lying around is probably a bad idea if you have curious children.There are many great moments in the volume, both funny and sad ones. And, I think it's time for me to check up volume 3...

Reviewing Saga vol.1 I wrote that this might be a masterpiece in the making. After reading vol.2, I'm now convinced that it's going to be. I'm not going to bother with any discussion of the content other than to say it builds perfectly from the first volume as more background is filled in, both setting and character, and more new stuff happens.The great delight of this series is that it's impossible to guess what is going to happen next. Each turn of the page brings new surprises, new twists, and unexpected developments. This is simply the best thing that Brian K. Vaughan has written and that's saying something.Fiona Staples art possesses a wonderful clarity and lightness of touch, providing just enough detail needed, and thereby propelling the story forward when many other artists would bring it to a halt by swamping the reader with an excess of detail.Completely unsuitable for children, for everyone else this is a sheer delight and one which is impossible to overpraise.

Volume one of this fantastic comic book series blew my mind! Fun characters, depth of story, dynamic twists and turns, cliff hanger/blizzar TBC, vibrant colours and a lot of 'lol' moments! Could they do it again?Volume two (issues 7-12) lives up to it nicley! With as much energy and drive as volume one (issues 1-6), this is a fantastic continuation and lacks nothing, except maybe propeltion to the 'next level'.But like so many graphic novels this one has not surpassed the first, though unlike most it has not lost anything and is still a fantastic read!Saga is current, fun and many people are massive fans! Give it a go, start with volume one and enjoy volume two straight away, now that the wait is over!Grab a cuppa, sit in that old arm chair and be transported into the world of Saga for another hour or two!

The second volume of this superbly original sci fi family saga is even better than the first. This has to be the very best and most original book currently out there.Vaughan's writing is spare but inspired and captures the tensions around the wider family unit, whilst not losing sight of the much bigger events happening around them.Fiona Staple's art is sublime- capturing the essence of the characters so well without the need to resort to complex scene arrangements.All in all the most perfect melding of script and art I've seen in many a year.Here's to Volume 3!