In a daring bid to even the percentage of mediocre 40k Hammer and Bolter episodes with those of Age of Sigmar, GW released the newest episode Eternal last week. Please note that this review contains spoilers, but the plot is so bland and predictable that it doesn’t mean much.
Plot Summary:
The plot revolves around the Exorcists who have captured an Emperor’s Children legionary and are interrogating him. Apparently, Lucius wishes to preserve the honor of the legion and assembles a small band to go after him. After being slain in combat, Lucius pulls his little party trick and meets up with the captured legionary, revealing his true motivation. He then fights his way out.
Review:
As with most action-focused Hammer and Bolter episodes, the poor animation is hard to ignore. The slideshow nature is distracting, and makes the combat scenes tedious. The stylization of Lucius and the Emperor’s children was cool, and they stayed true to his model without making him look out of place. An achievement given the sculpt’s age. The plot is fairly basic, and only really interesting if you know nothing about Lucius. He is a unique character in the lore, and so I felt the writers were trapped into explaining and showing his ability, so as not to confuse the uninitiated, but this took up a lot of screen time. The transformation happened too fast, in my opinion, and missed out on the chance to have a more interesting horror element.
Overall, if you like Lucius you will like this episode, although he is a bit flat as a character. Fans of the Exorcists might want to give this one a skip as they come out looking rather dumb. I felt this episode squandered an interesting premise which makes it harder to review, as you see what it could have been. I will be curious to see how long GW will keep adding to this series as the episodes release slowly, and the animation hasn’t really improved. There are some real gems in the collection, but most seem to take too long to release, while also appearing under-baked.
Final Episode Rating: B-
And remember, Frontline Gaming sells gaming products at a discount, every day in their webcart!
