It’s a big week for new stories in comics, in more ways than one. There is a veritable wealth of #1’s on the shelves this week, both from the solid indie creators like IDW and Image, and even some fun stuff from the big boys at Marvel. Let’s take a look at it and see what’s what.
Our first book this week is something that’s part of a fun trend in comics at IDW publishing. It’s Infected #1, a comic adaptation by Scott Sigler of the first novel in his original horror trilogy. IDW has been doing similar work with writers Stephen King and his son Joe Hill, who also created the publisher’s hit Locke and Key. Infected is the story of a new and deadly virus that’s growing in intensity across the U.S., and turning those infected with it into raving madmen who’ll engage in cruelty and bloodshed against anyone in their path. The CIA has assigned two agents and one genius pathologist to identify the disease, but coming up with a live carrier is proving more and more difficult, as the infected have a tendency toward mayhem that often leaves them … well, not entirely intact, much less alive. There’s an intensity to this book, and the art is very clean, almost digital looking, which helps push the heavy horror quotient pretty high. There are not a lot of strong characters developed here, however, as this feels like a book that’s just getting warmed up, and it remains to be seen how much social value we’ll find in further pages. It’s a page turner, though, and worth following for now.
Next up is Think Tank #1 from Image, created by writer Matt Hawkins and artist Rashan Kedel. It begins with the Einstein quote, “Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one’s living at it,” and gets more fun from there. Done in an excellent black and white style, Think Tank takes us inside the secretive world of military scientific development. The main character is David Loren, childhood science prodigy turned military scientist, who has decided he’s done building super weapons of destruction, mass or otherwise. His curiosity and creative edge are almost impossible to squash, however, and he’s soon designing cell phones that let him read the minds of others. He uses this to meet a young woman and bed her, which feels a little like some of last week’s slimier offerings, yet here the character shows understanding that what he is doing is wrong, and the tale seems to be about the inner moral struggles of using one’s gifts for things that are not nearly as valuable to the greater good as one might wish. David has a handy sidekick, a bullying former teacher and mentor, and an asshole military Colonel for a boss, and while I’m not wild about some o f the stereotypes (the Indian supersmart sidekick in particular), each character shows the beginnings of depth that make this series well worth exploring.
We move from the simply interesting to the seriously disturbing for our next new indie story, Harvest #1, also from Image in their Shadowline imprint series. Harvest is a gory tale of sex, drugs, and surgical malpractice that quickly spirals forth into illegal organ harvesting and gory, icy bath tub revenge. This book is rather graphic, both thematically and visually, and not for the faint of heart. It’s the tale of down and out loser surgeon Dr. Benjamin Dane, whose addictions have driven him from his profession. But a doctor’s skills are always in demand in the underworld, and it’s not long before the not-so-good doctor is plunging further into an abyss of his own making, operating on the daughter of the local Yakuza boss and being recruited for something much, much worse. This tale, told in a flashback, becomes the story of how Benjamin, wracked with guilt over the woman he let die and thus destroyed his career, goes on a rampage of medical revenge to reclaim illegally harvested organs, whether the new donors want to give them up or not. This is a dark tale that very nearly numbs the mind, and while the story telling takes a little while to get going, it’s a nice-set up for a very dark read.
Legendary erotica comic creator Howard Chaykin brings us the sequel to the work that put him on the map with Black Kiss 2, #1. The series is another stunning example of the black and white comic form, with erotica that can only be described as both esoteric and disturbing. The narrative here is in two chapters, filled with poetic voiceover and images that boggle the mind. It’s a prequel to Chaykin’s groundbreaking piece of ‘80’s noir erotica, giving us the origin of 20’s film star/vampire Charlie Kenton as he gets his first taste of the psycho-sexual, otherworldy darkness that dwells beyond the edges of our world, right in the cargo hold of The Titanic, no less. Chaykin’s ethereal writing style makes the erotic overtones here all the more darkly evocative, and this read, while not at the level of Chaykin’ original work, seems both compelling and disturbing at the same time.
And, since everything seems to come in pairs this week, we have two works from the big boys at Marvel. First up is Hawkeye #1, from the always exciting writer Matt Fraction with art by David Aja. Aja’s art is, in fact, the first thing that grabs the reader here with a style that looks like gritty Darwin Cooke. The sheer weight of the art lends itself to the story of an Avenger in his day to day life, and a hero who’s honestly not particularly super. This is much more a story of Clint Barton than Hawkeye, illustrated by the fact that he is only seen in costume here in about 6 panels, to open the book. In the seventh, he’s literally in traction, reminding us that not all the kids who put on tights and masks in the Marvel Universe are bulletproof. This is the story of a hero in the real world, dealing with the unscrupulous slum lords of New York City in a very direct way (he lives in one of their slums, not Avengers Mansion, it turns out). Sure, he tussles with some stereotypical Russian mafia baddies, but he also has neighbors, neighbors who represent the ethnic diversity that is the gritty New York Clint Barton calls home. The first issue is also a bit of a one shot, and clearly designed to capitalize on Mr. Jeremy Renner’s recent popular turn in the third most popular movie in the world, but it’s a nice look at a hero who’s also a real person, something that’s welcome in comics.
Marvel’s second foray into new stories isn’t quite so accurate, sadly. The new origin tale of Wolverine and Sabertooth, The First X-Men #1, has some equally fine artistic work by Neal Adams, but Christos Gage’s story, set in the years before Charles Xavier decided to found the X-Men at all, feels a little forced. There’s also some pretty negative examples of femininity here, including an all new mutant character in the X-verse, Holly Bright. Miss Bright can conjure one’s dreams into temporary seeming reality, but uses the skill, sadly, to project an unrealistic femme fatal image of herself to everyone. In fact, she’s actually an awkward looking teenage girl and she sells her ability as a service in dirty back alleys. While the only client we see turns out to be “buying” a chance to have a conversation with a deceased child, the way the scene plays out we still get the impression that selling the odd unsavory dream to the seedy is something that Miss Bright has done before. It’s compelling to see Wolverine want to do good for the mutants of the world before Charles decides that that’s what mutants should do, but it feels like combination of poor revisionist X-Men history, and pandering to the audience who are enjoying Marvel’s newer, softer Wolverine (in the mainstream X-books he’s virtually a pacifist these days). This is another book attempting to visually capture a bit of a noir element, but the art can’t give value to the story in this case, and it honestly may not be worth following, young Magneto or no young Magneto.
And with all that, there’s still more, though much of it is far less interesting. Marvel has a third new offering this week, with the darkly funny horror what-if comic Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe #1. IDW has a new series installment of it’s simplistic, Heroically-Super-Situation-Comedy-Comic-Book, Love and Capes: What to Expect #1, in which the perfect super family with absolutely zero personal or professional issues has a baby (yawn). Dead World: War of the Dead #1 is a zombie tale that follows a previous tale with raw edged artwork by Sam Makkonen, but the story requires that you do some back reading to make any sense of it. Still, pick it up and flip through it, just for the original visual style.
A large crop of new comics stories this week, indeed, and while there weren’t a lot of high social concepts being bandied about, there were some good old fashioned comics in the mix. Enjoy reading!
