Book Review
Title: Locke & Key Volume 3: Crown of Shadows (Locke & Key #3)
Author: Joe Hill & Gabriel Rodríguez (Artist)
Genre: Graphic Novel/Horror/Fantasy
Rating: ***
Review: So far, this series is showing the Netflix adaptation was faithful apart from minor elements, despite that I did enjoy Volume 1 more than Volume 2 because of the info-dumping in the second volume that sets up the major mystery of this series. I noticed quite early in this volume that it started to deviate from the show quite a bit, not in terms of the story that relatively remains the same but it terms of pacing. This volume opens with the Locke matriarch getting drunk after learning that Duncan is in the hospital and the entity using one of its newly acquired keys; the shadow key to haunt the family with shadow demons that reflect their fears, so the fears of each child are different based on their age, worries and life experiences which was an awesome nuance that the show actually maintained just in a slightly different way.
However, fairly quickly the pace was turned up to an impossible level, things were happen so quickly we didn’t even really have time to process what they might in terms of the wider story that is being built. Kinsey finds the caves that her father and his friends used but completely misses the dead body there of Dodge, their mother also comes into possession of the echo key, the mending key and purely by accident the omega key which is the key the entity wants the most although we don’t know why yet. Something else that changed between the comic and the show was how the entity acquired the keys, in the show the entity really had to work for them as the Locke children tried to prevent them falling into the entity’s hands at all cost but in the comic the children are barely aware of the entity and it seems to find the keys quickly easily and randomly as well. The only change that should have been in the show was the ghost showdown between Sam Lesser, the man that killed Rendell Locke and the entity and how Sam is now fighting against the entity from beyond the grave rather than working with it.
I also have to say I really don’t like the mother in the comics, in the show she does have a drinking problem but she is in control of it whereas the mother in the comics is now often getting drunk and even hitting Kinsey at one point because she was stating the truth made me really dislike her. It has forced Kinsey and Tyler into being parents since their father’s death as their mother is in no position to be looking after Bode who is a very high energy, energetic child and is prone to saying and doing things he shouldn’t which is exactly how he came across the entity in the first place. Overall, Crown of Shadows while it has some intense action sequences and really moves the story forward was my least favourite of the series so far but still a great read.
Buy it here:
Paperback/Hardcover: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
Kindle Edition: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
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