For over 10 years Victor Santos has produced Polar as a digital web comic, with no dialogue, that follows the world’s best super soldier, The Black Kaiser, turned assassin as he carries out his assignments for the highest bidder. Beginning in 2013 Dark Horse approached Victor Santos about collecting each season of the web comic into a hard cover book. In response to this proposal Santos took this as an opportunity to correct and expand the comic by including new elements to the story, new art, and adding dialogue that was missing from the original web comic. As of 2019 the story can be read across five volumes starting with Polar (Volume 0): The Black Kaiser.
Summary:
Polar (Volume 0): The Black Kaiser is a complex tale of governments using hired guns as a means to manipulate their citizens and other foreign governments. This is done through the U.S. hiring Black Kaiser (BK) to kill a Saudi Arabian man. Conversely, the Saudi Arabian government has hired a former lover of Black Kaiser, Agent Irfit, to interfere with his mission. The US government and the Saudi Arabian government have their own agendas. In the U.S. they are using Black Kaiser as a threat to get more money for surveillance and to use him as a scapegoat for a terrorist attack. This will provide the Pentagon and a secret organization within the government named Damocles Initiative with more power and media coverage to carry out their agenda to pit several countries against each other. The Saudi’s goal is to drive the price of oil up as the U.S. will continue to buy from them and they will take that money and buy equity in American Corporations. When the oil dries up they will own America. As all of this is occurring the U.S. government dispatches agent Tartarus to tie up all loose ends with Black Kaiser to ensure that Damocles Initiative plan can be carried through. Dispute being older and having seen better days Black Kaiser manages to neutralize the threat of Agent Tartarus to continue his assignment of killing his man despite being set up by a secret organization.
Significance:
Polar (Volume 0): The Black Kaiser sets the stage on how the entire series will play out. This is done through a variety of circumstances starting with background information on who the Black Kaiser is including his training, morals, associates, past lovers, and variety of skills. As a result, we begin to understand who, how, why, and what Black Kaiser is capable of doing and why he is doing it. Furthermore, the graphic novel reveals that the assignment Black Kaiser was sent on, to assassinate a man, was a set up by a group, the Damocles Initiative/ Agency, that is deep within the U.S. government. This group’s rational was to gain more money, power, and get the media on their side for their own agenda while using Black Kaiser as a pawn. In knowing who Black Kaiser is, as the graphic novel reveals, this naturally sets up a confrontation that will be drawn out over the next 4 volumes as he attempts to deal with the people who threatened his way of life and it can only end when one side is completely dead. Volume 0 of Polar is the shot that set off the war between Black Kaiser and the Damocles Initiative/ Agency.
