MISC. MANGA, *Steampunk Snow White

Since Rod Espinosa had already covered Cinderella and Hansel & Gretel in some of the previous Antarctic Press steampunk specials, he went and made this into a full-color fleshed-out adventure.

Set in a fairy tale environment, an evil Queen is using her steam-powered mechas to enforce her taxation of the poor. The only one opposing her is the masked vigilante, the Lone Fox. The Queen’s forces set a trap for him, but a daring swordwoman saves him. She is revealed to be the Queen’s daughter, Snow. The Queen stages a situation for Snow’s sensei to slay her, but instead he allows her to escape. Snow makes her way to a cottage not owned by dwarves, but really seven large taking badgers. Together, Snow teams up with them to stop the Queen’s raids. The Queen then does the routine of disguising herself as an old peddler, and feeds Snow a poison apple. The badgers stop her, but Snow then falls into a deep sleep. Fortunately, the Lone Fox shows up to save her, and is really a prince himself.

Espinosa brings back his brilliant use of color here, and manages to tell the overdone Snow White story in a decent new way. It does seem like the ending was a little more briefer than it was supposed to be, but all in all its still a great one-shot comic for the whole family.