An interesting story about fanaticism vs. totalitarianism.
I'm not a fan of the Ender's Game universe. In fact, I've never read any of the books. I happened across this book from a grab bag and if I wasn't intrigued by the title 'War of Gifts', I would have overlooked this Christmas time set comic book.
A young boy named Zeck Morgan is taken from the home of a pair of religious fanatics who are staunch pacifists, by representatives of the Battle School. The lad does everything he can to refuse to participate in the war games of the school due to those beliefs. But for some stubborn reason, the headmaster of the Battle School refuses to let the child wash-out.
On what would be the Christmas season on Earth, Zeck observes a Dutch lad providing a gift from Saint Nicolas to a fellow cadet. As any sort of celebration of faith, including holiday observances is strictly forbidden by the Battle School, Zeck rats the kid out. But the headmaster refuses to do anything. In protest to this, Zeck starts a miniature holy war at the academy. For if he can't be allowed to practice his religious beliefs then nobody should be allowed to either. Hopefully, child prodigy Ender Wiggin can put this young man in his place...
I enjoyed this book. It's not turned me into a devotee of Ender's Game or Orson Scott Card or anything like that. It was a good single issue read and that's all I need unless there ever is another holiday themed issue set in the Ender's Game universe.
I personally feel terrible for Zeck Morgan. His parents just seem awful. The boy is raised to be a pacifist and yet he and his whole family are angry, bitter people. Everyone isn't good enough to be a Christian in their opinion and something like Santa Claus is considered a gateway drug to Hell instead of an opening door to Heaven. These kind of Christians give believers like myself a bad name and I very much wish atheists and those who hate religion understood that the body of Christ isn't all like the Morgan family.
Oddly enough, the Battle School seems the more reasonable institution. Well, at least the headmaster does. He overlooks these small acts of faith of his students as long as it doesn't interfere with the mission. Zeck thinks the practice of religion should be all or nothing. He doesn't realize that the headmaster of the Battle School is giving Zeck as much grace as that Dutch boy in allowing them both to express their beliefs.
As for how this story aligns with the views of Orson Scott Card, I understand that there are some critics who believe the author to be homophobic. Maybe he is. But I've never met the man personally and other than this adaptation, I've never read anything else he's written before. I collect holiday themed comics. It's one of my favorite genres to collect and this book will stay as a part of my collection. If this causes me to lose readers of my blog, I won't apologize as I refuse to participate in censorship and to me, cancel culture IS censorship. I give my opinions on the books I read based on personal taste and quality of both the storytelling and art. The story by Jake Black was very well crafted. The art by Timothy Green II, was a little rough as I sometimes had trouble discerning who was who. But then again, I think that sort of homogeneity is part of the point behind the Battle School; like when a soldier is in basic training and the drill instructors try to strip away individuality for the good of the outfit.
I liked it. It might not be your traditional holiday story. In fact, those holidays are verboten and basically all but ignored. But it was set during the holidays of the future and had holiday themes. So despite looking like a generic sci-fi comic, this issue is really a Christmas miracle if you dig deeper to examine the content of the story.
Worth Consuming!
Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.
