DANGER GIRL: TRINITY

Written by Andy Hartnell | Art by John Royle, Harvey Tolibao and Stephen Molnar
Additional Inks by Philip Moy | Colored by Romulo Fajardo
Lettered by Neil Uyetake | Edited by Scott Dunbier
Danger Girl Created By J. Scott Campbell & Andy Hartnell

TRINITY is a bit of an experiment for the DANGER GIRL series, though I would argue that it's not experimental enough. The advertised premise is that we get to see each of the core cast members -- Abbey, Sydney, and Sonya -- in a solo adventure, but this claim is only half true. The three girls are engaged in their own storylines when we first meet up with them, but the stories almost immediately intersect as part of one larger plot.

We first cover Abbey, on "vacation" in search of a priceless relic and at the mercy of her rival, Spencer Cross, making a return appearance following his debut in REVOLVER. Abbey manages an escape from Cross, but is captured by servants of a sultan named A'zeel Amahz, who wants Abbey to locate an ancient crown for him.

Following Abbey's kidnapping, Deuce contacts Sydney in London and sets her off on a search for her wayward teammate. But when Sydney is attacked immediately, she realizes someone is onto the rescue attempt and asks Deuce to warn Sonya.

Thus we join up with Sydney's sister in the Congo, also on her "day off", bounty hunting. She winds up working together with her quarry, a man named Dallas, to escape another group of the same mercenaries that pursued Sydney.

All roads eventually lead to Egypt, where Abbey finds the long-lost crown for Amahz, now revealed as the descendent of a usurper who wants to destroy the ancient relic which could prove his claim to the throne is false. With a little help from Dallas, the Danger Girls thwart Amahz, who is blown up by his own explosives, and install the proper descendent of the original sultan, a girl who had previously shown up as a member of Amahz's harem.

I like the idea of showcasing each Danger Girl on her own mission, but I would have preferred if they were actually completely unrelated stories. This particular series isn't even laid out in a way that the girls seem to be on separate missions before threading together -- it's clear from the outset that Sydney and Sonya, while on their own, are embroiled in Abbey's situation.

But, though the story may not live up to its potential, there are some nice moments strewn throughout. Abbey's adventure is typical Abbey, on the trail of some priceless object or another, so there's not a lot to say on her end, other than that it's nice to see Spencer Cross return as an antagonist -- still, inexplicably, with two bandaged fingers on his right hand. You'd think they would've clotted by now.

Sydney, on the other hand, shows us a side of herself we haven't seen before, as we join her following a second date coitus with a fellow named Bryan. This is the first time we see any of the Danger Girls as anything less than perfectly chaste, and it's somewhat refreshing. Johnny Barracuda is nowhere to be seen in TRINITY, which is fine -- but it seems that when he's out of Sydney's sight he's out of her mind as well, considering that in previous stories the two seem to have a very mutual romance going on.

We also get a welcome spotlight on Sonya. This is her third appearance after REVOLVER and the G.I. JOE crossover, but even through both of those stories, she remained little more than a Sydney clone with a bow and arrow instead of a whip. Here, at least, we see her in action as a bounty hunter, and we get a sense that she and Sydney actually care about one another more than they let on. She also has a slightly amusing chemistry with her bounty, Dallas, and I wouldn't mind seeing him pop up again in the future.

Lastly, as with any DANGER GIRL story, the artwork is a major make-or-break component of TRINITY, and it's mostly very nice. Each girl's section of the story is illustrated by a different artist. We have John Royle, artist of DANGER GIRL/G.I. JOE, returning for Abbey's installment, and he's just as good as ever. At this point Royle's style is closer to J. Scott Campbell's work circa the original DANGER GIRL series than anything we've seen since, which obviously makes him a perfect fit for the series.

Royle also revisits the original series' first page "Abbey Chase!" splash image, the second time this has happened in recent years, but something which continues to be a fun tribute nonetheless.

Left: J. Scott Campbell, 1998. Right: John Royle, 2013.

Sonya's portion of the adventure is penciled by Stephen Molnar. I'm unfamiliar with Molnar, but I really like his work here. It brings to mind favorable comparisons with Frank Cho and Terry Dodson. The facial expressions are wonderfully comical when called for, and the pictures are very clean and crisp. The weak link in the art team, then, is Harvey Tolibao on Sydney's story. Tolibao is not a bad artist; in fact he's quite talented. But he doesn't fit the DANGER GIRL aesthetic like the other two. Plus he doesn't spot enough black into Sydney's hair, which means that the auburn color, combined with her black catsuit, make her look exactly like Marvel's Black Widow and not very much like DANGER GIRL's Sydney Savage.

Left: Art by Harvey Tolibao. Right: Art by Stephen Molnar.

TRINITY is probably one of the weaker DANGER GIRL outings thus far, which is especially disappointing following on the heels of the excellent REVOLVER. If Hartnell had actually produced three totally separate stories spotlighting the Danger Girls, it might have been better. But as it is, it's really only the artwork of Royle and Molnar that makes it worth reading.

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