The Dark Tower 6: The Gunslinger—The Journey Begins

Comic Info

The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger–The Journey Begins #1

Reprints The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger—The Journey Begins #1-5 (July 2010-November 2010). Roland pursues the Man in Black across the desert and encounters a man on his way. Roland stays with the man and tells him the story of what occurred to him after the Battle of Jericho Hill. Roland recalls discovering Aileen near death and promising to return her to Gilead one last time…to die.

Written by Peter David and Robin Furth, The Dark Tower Volume 6:  The Gunslinger—The Journey Begins starts the official adaptation of Stephen King’s 1982 novel The Dark Tower I:  The Gunslinger.  Following The Dark Tower Volume 5: The Battle of Jericho Hill, the series features art by Sean Phillips and Richard Isanove.  The issues in the collection were also collected as part of The Dark Tower:  The Gunslinger Omnibus.

After five volumes, I couldn’t wait for this comic.  The official Peter David and Robin Furth’s adaptation of Stephen King’s The Dark Tower 1: The Gunslinger begins…sort of. The story sets in motion the events of The Dark Tower I, but gets side tracked by this story of what occurred to him to get him in the pursuit of the Man in Black.

This feels like a bit of a cop-out to call it The Gunslinger when it really is just more of the same. The first comic storyline, The Gunslinger Born actually adapted The Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass but since then, it has been essentially new stories of the Gunslinger or adaptations of short stories. This book might be necessary to tie up loose ends to get to the real The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger story, but it shouldn’t “trick” the reader into thinking things are really changing.

The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger–The Journey Begins #3

The structure of this story is also a bit weird. In reality, the whole comic book series to this point has been a flashback since the first issue of The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born, he was already flashing back to his childhood. This story however has “present day” but then he tells what happened in the past and then falls into another flashback within his flashback. It is a bit confusing and his experience with Hax doesn’t really add much to the story.

The second part of the story about Kingston really doesn’t add much to the story, but it does show a different side to the Dark Tower world with the technology based Not-Men. There had been hints of technology with Farson’s army having tanks and the use of oil, but the Not-Men actually are using high tech cloaking devices that aren’t mystical in nature.

The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger—The Journey Begins shows good traction in a story that has been somewhat bogged down and stalled. I am glad to see Roland moving on to adventures I know, but the journey to the Dark Tower is so long that it will still be ages before we get to experience them. The Dark Tower 6: The Gunslinger—The Journey Begins is followed by The Dark Tower 7: The Gunslinger—The Little Sisters of Eluria.

Preceded By:

The Dark Tower Volume 5:  The Battle of Jericho Hill

Followed By:

The Dark Tower 7: The Gunslinger—The Little Sisters of Eluria

Related Links:

The Dark Tower I:  The Gunslinger