2 out of 5

Again, I feel like we’re letting nostalgia lead the way here.  Because Paolo Leandri’s art – which, it should be noted, was McGovern’s starting point for the story – mixed with old schooler Dom Regan’s poppy colors and a nice Exclamation Pointed! design scheme by Steve Price and Lynn Brunskill do make for a pretty badass look, with some mystic Ditko touches supporting an awesome Kirbyness.  And the look isn’t strictly an old-school tribute, the kind of tired sameness that Allred slips into; Leandri owns the style, giving his characters his own oddball look and – while certainly a lover of Kirby’s foreshortening – frankly a bit slicker when it comes to laying out action, of which there’s plenty (with clanty of “Crash!,” “Wiss!,” and “Zak!” sound effects).  McGovern’s story tries to bridge the same divide, bringing 60s / 70s fantasy and its accompanying verbosity into a present awareness without it being too cheek.  He succeeds, somewhat, as the in-book banter is consistent, but that doesn’t really make it good.  It doesn’t ring with the honesty of old-school writing, in part because – as some of the waxing on in the backmatter and claims on the back cover suggest – he’s taking this a bit too seriously.  It’s all in good fun… with some type of ‘meaning’ wended in, and that’s what causes the pace to stutter, unable to fully sidle up to the art’s slickness.  That and that McGovern struggles to actually tell us a sensible story, with a ton of info worked into the inside cover preamble, and the lead demon – Plenilunio’s – quest to get a book and a key to rescue his lover already rendered half pointless by the first issue, turning one of those items into something of a MacGuffin… until it becomes a deus ex machina instead.  You know, whichever is easiest.

So the story bored.  The inspired suggests the ideas are there, but since the art led to the development of the story, who can say.  So I don’t not get the interest, because ‘Nightworld’ reeks of nostalgia, but I have to believe there are more well-rounded and interesting applications of that.