Essa é uma edição especial da Pixel, linda, para colecionadores.
Alex Raymond foi um artista à frente de seu tempo e um pioneiro dos quadrinhos (ou melhor, das tiras dominicais).
Um de seus personagens mais importantes foi Flash Gordon, uma referência da ficção científica que merece a deferência pela criatividade de suas aventuras e pela beleza atemporal de sua arte. Ainda que obviamente muita coisa seja datada, é impossível não imaginar o deslumbre que os jovens leitores sentiam ao acompanhar tamanha sofisticação em arte e narrativa em 1936. Uma beleza que impressiona ainda hoje. Para os fãs das HQs e da ficção científica, vale ter essa obra encadernada em capa dura e formato especial que ainda conta com textos de apresentação do artista. ( )

The first years of Flash Gordon (January 1934 to April 1937) established the groundwork for everything to come, and you watch month to month as Alex Raymond develops from good artist into a legend. Flash Gordon was one of the most influential works of the imagination in the 20th century, and these stories are both exciting and visually rich. The reproductions are as good as you'll find right now, which isn't always great. Fine intro by Alex Ross plus a historical essay. ( )

I was surprised at how closely the Buster Crabbe Flash Gordon movie serial adheres to its source material, presented in sumptuous style in this collection. Created as an answer to the science fiction, space opera adventures of the Buck Rogers newspaper serial, I think Flash's adventures owe a greater debt to the planetary romance and lost world genres of Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter and Caspak novels, the war-torn planet of Mongo with its many-coloured peoples standing in for Barsoom, and the wild lands tormented by giant monsters (Devourosaurus being a particular personal favourite!) reminiscent of Caprona.

There's also a Ruritanian feel to some of the political machinations and empire building plots; an unreflective acceptance of Flash's imperialistic ambitions. Ming is 'Merciless' and a despotic tyrant, but when he promises to make Flash a king, only to reveal that the promised country is not held under his sway, Flash glibly recruits an army and takes his weapons of mass destruction to slaughter and subdue a people of whose existence he had previously been unaware, and whose right of self-determination is not considered and clearly of no consequence to him. Published in the mid 1930s, it sadly seems that many politicians still hold these attitudes today.

Anyway, dubious politics aside, the adventures are inevitably episodic and wholly action-oriented, with no character development and the main motivations given as obsessive passions of love, hate and revenge. This is a weakness or a strength depending on one's preferences. For me it's a venture into juvenile escapism that I sometimes feel the need for. While the story lines are fairly static and formulaic, though not without charm, the artwork definitely does evolve. Tightly contained in gridiron panels for the initial six months of the original publication schedule, there starts to be a slight freeing of the page layout, although it takes a further six months or so for Raymond to really gain confidence (if, indeed, that was what was previously lacking, rather than, perhaps, some restriction of the newspaper medium he was working in) and to start presenting his panels in a more fluid, less linear fashion. The detail and intricacy of the artwork certainly benefits from the change, capturing a certain epic sweep which looks like it might be story boards for Hollywood historical blockbusters like Ben Hur.

Naturally, the book ends in the middle of an adventure - Flash is always enmired in some plot, the resolution of one thread leading immediately into another perilous cliffhanger. I could easily go on to read the next volume without pause, while at the same time feeling no urgency to do so: every pause in reading has been at a pivotal moment of danger, so I've become inured to that narrative device. Whether or not I'm there to read it, I'm confident that Dale will be kidnapped, that Flash will hunt down and kill/befriend the abductor, that whatever life-threatening position Flash finds himself in, Zarkov will build a ray-machine out of brown paper and string which will save the day. The only question in my mind is whether, after four years of prevarication and more romantic entanglements with exotic women than Captain Kirk could shake a phaser at, Flash will ever make good on his promise to marry Dale! ( )

Unfortunately I found this volume rather disappointing. Ignoring the silly racism and sexism, there simply wasn't much of a story to speak of, nor were the characters ever more than superficial. The introduction is partially to blame, for it had upped my expectations by off-handedly comparing this to Hal Foster's Prince Valiant. ( )

very good condition