The Emperor’s Might:Warriors of the Imperium is the 2nd in John Blanche’s latest
series of art books published by Black Library, following on from “The Emperor’s Will: Agents of the Imperium”.
It retails at £25 from the Black Library website but as it’s not an exclusive
you can pick it up on Amazon for around £16. It was released in November 2012.
Book Structure,
Layout and Craftsmanship
I always like a well made and nicely presented book and The
Emperor’s Might does not disappoint. The quality of the book is first class, examining
from the outside, it is hardcover, A4 sized with a dust jacket and bookmark
ribbon. Beneath the dust jacket are the same front and back cover design and
spine as on the dust jacket. Inside it is printed on high quality glossy paper
and is full colour throughout (except for the black and white drawings); it has
no printed page numbers but comes in at 144pp. The glossy paper really adds to
the vibrancy of the images and one of the nicest things about it is that most
pictures contained within stretch right to the edge of each page meaning that
images are as large as possible with a minimum of wasted space.
The copyright page is located at the back, something which
I’m a fan of with themed books, like this one, but it is most relevant for “In
character” books such as “The Imperial Infantryman’s Uplifting Primer” and the
“Liber Chaotica” books which benefit from a minimum of actual real world
content as it breaks the feel of the book. I thought this was a nice touch with
this art book.
One little niggle I had about the outside was wishing that
the spine off this and the previous book were numbered. If as I believe the
idea is to produce a series of these books, it would have been nice to have
them numbered.
Content
The book is entitled “The
Emperor’s Might: Warriors of the Imperium” and was advertised on the Black
Library Website as being solely about the Space Marines. Anyone who thought
that this would contain any Imperial forces besides marines will be
disappointed.
The first thing that many people would notice is that
besides the front and back leaves of the Dust Jacket, the title page and the
copyright page located at the back, there is no text at all throughout the
book. The front dust jacket leaf describes the contents of the book explaining
that it is a collection of never before seen and old classics examining the
Space Marines while the back leaf contains a short bio of John Blanche.
The pictures are universally excellent, and I believe that
this is the definitive collection of space marine related art produced by Black
Library and the Games Workshop art department. Looking at the contributor’s
page it is clear that pretty much every Games Workshop artist has some of their
work included. If anyone is interested, here is a list of the artists whose
work has been included:
Ryan Barger, John Blanche, Paul Bonner, Alex Boyd, Matt Bradbury, Kevin Chin, Paul Dainton, Mauro Dalbo, Simon Eckert, Wayne England, Hardy Fowler, David Gallagher, Jes Goodwin, Nickolaus Ingeneri, Jason Juta, Igor Kieryluk, Karl Kopinski, Kekai Kotaki, Clint Langley, Cheoljoo Lee, Michael Phillippi, Will Rees, Neil Roberts, John Sibbick, Adrian Smith, Theo Stylianides, Jon Sulllivan, Geoff Taylor, Kev Walker, Richard Wright, Andrea Uderzo.
It’s worth noting that
some of these artists are related to Fantasy Flight Games (FFG) and that some
of the artwork included in this book has been commissioned by FFG for their
series of Role-palying games set in the 40k universe. I don’t know for sure
which books, but would assume that they came from the Deathwatch series as
these focus on the Space Marines.
So what about the images included? It’s hard to sum up an
art book using words, but all the classics are here: The Rogue Trader cover, 2nd
and 3rd edition box covers and I believe pretty much all space
marine related codices covers are here in full A4 size. Along with most images that
you could think of that focus on the Space Marines. Slightly disappointingly John
Blanche’s images of the Primarchs are not included nor are there any pre 41st millennium
images; the book appears to focus solely on images set in the current 40k time
period. True to the blurb’s word there is a selection of new artwork, although sometimes
I struggle to pick out what I’ve seen before and what is new! Personal highlights
would have to be the final two both of Dark Angels in their robes looking
rather battle worn.
What the art of Warhammer 40,000 does so well is firmly
establish the theme and style of the 41st millennium. It shows you
the bleakness and weirdness of the Galaxy in a way and to a level that the
miniatures and novels can never quite achieve (refuse to use the word “Grimdark”
here). You can read all about space marine battles, but to use a cliché, a
picture can tell a thousand words, and this book does that exceedingly well, if
you like Space Marines.
This is the selection of images availible on the Black Library website, if you want more, google turns up some good video reviews -
Improvements
I do have a few issues with the book, not so much complaints
but improvements that would make it feel more “definitive” and complete. Much
as I like the lack of text and full sized images sometimes I find myself
craving a little bit of input or discussion from the artists, especially a bit
of retrospective about the classic pieces, talking about the history, setting
and the “feel” behind the pieces. On top of this, the anal part of me wants the
mundane details, about each individual piece for example: artist, date, medium and so on. I think
including the artist of each piece is the most important, for while some are
easily recognisable, for many of the pieces I have no idea of the artist. These
wouldn’t have to be printed over the pictures themselves but could have been
included as appendices at the end linked by number back to the pieces.
Discussion
Some people may be disappointed having picked this book up
to find it is nothing but pictures of Space Marines, but what you have to
understand is that the same thing could have occurred with the previous book
The Emperor’s Will, where people found themselves disappointed that it is
nothing but images of the Inquisition. Remember that this is an art book with a
single focus, much as the previous book was. What this allows is that each individual
book can be dedicated to a single topic, in this case a collection of 25 years
of Space marine art, without the need for variety that previous art books have
need to include.
Hopefully, if this series continues then we will see a whole
host of art books focusing on different subjects: The Imperial Guard, Deamons
and the forces of Chaos, Xenos, maybe even focusing on individual armies, Orks,
Elder, Tau etc. (one can only hope). If this were to happen, then I believe
some of the complaints and perceived problems would evaporate as there would be
books to suit every palate.
Despite a few complaints I feel that this is one of the best
art books to come out of Black Library & Games Workshop, however that rests
on the follow-up entries as well. Without being able to assess the series as a
whole or know what will be in subsequent books, it’s impossible to say what is
and what isn’t missing. Now I just want to see what book three in this series
is going to be about, fingers crossed for a Xenos themed one, “The Emperor’s
Foes” or something like that!
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