Gunslinger #3 - Stephen King's The Dark Tower - The Gunslinger Born Three

The Gunslinger Born Issue #1 took us through Roland's confrontation with Marten, the knowledge of his mother's adultery and his battle with Cort-- as the adult Roland, son of Steven traveled back in his mind as he pursued Walter, the Man in Black, Court Wizard Marten and the man of so many other names across the desert-- to the beginning of his career as a Gunslinger.

The Gunslinger Born Issue #2 showed us the plotting in realms of evil, as Steven Deschain sends off Roland along with his friends, Cuthbert Algood and Alain Johns, Gunslinger trainees to Hambry in the Barony of Mejis while the Crimson King pulls the strings of his minions, Court Wizard Marten whose plot to destroy Roland has failed and must now flee under threat of arrest from Steven Deschain, the foul witch Rhea of Cöos, the Big Coffin Hunters-- minions of Farson the Good Man who is carving a bloody path through the Affiliation-- who together with Mayor Thorin rule in Hambry.

The Gunslinger Born Issue #3 brings us to Susan's first meeting with Roland, who passes himself off as Wil Dearborn, part of a party of young men taking stock of Hambry's horses for the Affiliation's campaign against Farson. Susan Delgado is the daughter of Pat Delgado, murdered for his stock and she, disinherited because a daughter cannot inherit in the Barony of Mejis. Roland and Susan walk back together and kiss, where Susan warns Roland to pretend not to know her when he sees her with Mayor Thorin for the first time-- to whom she will serve as a concubine.

For the most part-- more so than Gunslinger Born Issue Two-- Three Gunslinger Born Issue Three, covers ground that had already been covered in Wizard and Glass. Roland's first meeting with Susan, the arrival of Roland, Cuthbert and Alain to the Mayor's house and the confrontation with the Big Coffin Hunters were all featured in The "Dark Tower: Wizard and Glass". However Jae Lee's artwork reduces scenes to their elemental natures, revealing and concealing in cinematic flashes, the shadowed outline of Roland and Susan first meeting in the darkness-- as seen in the opening page below-- the glint of expression in Susan's eye or in Roland's as they meet again and Roland sees what her life is and he learns what hers is, the tense Mexican standoff that develops between Roland, Cuthbert, Alain and the Big Coffin Hunters rendered in "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly" classic Western Sergio Leone frames and angles.

And then there is the background-- our first view of Farson, who has remained an ominous off screen presence throughout the Dark Tower saga and unlike The Crimson King, never made even a belated last minute appearance. (Though considering how disappointing and anti-climactic the Crimson King's appearance was, as an old man throwing grenades, that really is not saying very much.) According to the brief sketchbook in the back of Issue 3, Jae Lee attempted two versions of the Farson scene and discarded the first one that showed a thick and burly Farson, as opposed to the second final version that shows Farson as bloody and gaunt. Arguably Jae Lee's first rendering of Farson was superior-- but we take what we can get.

The Farson we encounter is drawn in red, much as befits a minion of The Crimson King who was depicted in a red realm as well. We see him among the ruins of a city, taking bets on how far he can bat a bloodied severed head with his sword. Around him are shattered buildings, ruined docks and broken steel everywhere. When Marten meets with him, yet another circle has been closed and as with The Crimson King dispaptching the 'Grapefruit' to Rhea of Coos-- in this round as we go through the circle of Ka, we can see the villainy at work behind the scenes.

Additions to Issue #3, include Jae Lee's sketches, a rather pointless transcription of a panel with Stephen King, Joe Queseda, Lee, Peter David and others-- the bulk of which is taken up by Queseda's introductions and silly questions by audience members. Far more interesting is the attached tale of the birth of the Gunslingers under Arthur Eid. Like-- or perhaps he was our Arthur-- Arthur Eid brought order using his sword Excalibur and his two guns-- Colt revolvers which he got from some unknown land and eventually equipped his knights with. The origin of the Gunslingers is thus tied to our own world which Arthur Eid must have visited at some point.

The opening introduction on Susan and Roland's meeting informs us that they are doomed lovers, destined for oblivion yet encountering one another again and again, hoping to beat the odds. That raises the question if they might not beat them this time? The issue depends on whether or not The Gunslinger Born takes place in the same turning of the wheel of Ka as Wizard and Glass and the rest of the first Dark Tower series does. Since The Dark Tower ended by reverting back in time again and since Stephen King has expressed a desire to rewrite the books all over again-- if he has time, it makes one wonder or perhaps faintly hope that this time Roland may make a different choice, Susan over the Dark Tower and that this time Susan Delgado may survive. Even if it is an extremely faint and unlikely hope.

Either way the battle is coming and as in Issue Three, we have already seen the Thinny where the fateful ambush will take place-- in either the next issue or the one after that or perhaps the one after that-- and the prophecy appears to have set Roland's destiny-- but in between will come a collision between Roland, a boy hardened by the world and bound to the Dark Tower and swiftly growing into a very hard man, the hardest there ever was-- and his companions, still boys themselves, but with the ruthless casual grace of the trained killers that they already are-- and the Big Coffin Hunters marked with the tattoos of Farson's men, determined to protect Farson's hold over Hambry for its oil-- the oil refineries which process the oil that is the engine that drives men's wars. In Jae Lee's first sketch of the Farson scene-- we see at least one downed tank and Farson is clearly relying on mechanized armor to get the job done.