THE AMERICAN
Written by Mark Verheiden and Drawn by Various
Published by Dark Horse

Reporter Dennis Hough gets far more than he bargained for when he begins to dig deep into the secrets of The American, a government sponsored “superhero.” It turns out the that character has a history of one dirty, awful secret after another, and the men who run the program will stop at nothing to see him stopped. Not even when The American himself decides that enough might just be enough.

Reading this book made me smile quite a bit, because I remember these stories like they came out yesterday. Longtime readers of this column know that I was a huge Dark Horse geek early on in the company’s history, and THE AMERICAN was no small part of that. Verheiden’s masterful look at governmental corruption and the way those under fire manipulate the media resonated hard for those of us who had lived through the Iran/Contra scandal. It was an obvious touchstone for the writer, but he managed to make the book about so much more. Verheiden touched on themes of duty, responsibility, and the true meaning of patriotism in ways that no other comic in the era was even coming close to doing. THE AMERICAN was an incredible action piece, but it was also a wonderful character study, as we watched Hough fall prey to his own demons in ways we hadn’t seen very often in comics. He was an alcoholic, he had a penchant for hitting the woman he loved… these were difficult things to reconcile for someone who was our protagonist and whose eyes we were seeing The American through.

Besides dialogue that feels as fresh now as it did then (Hough describes watching a fat little boy die of a heart attack as “like watching the Michelin tire man go down for the count”) the series was blessed with some wonderful artists. The great Chris Warner was first out of the gate, and guys like Doug Braithwaite and Chris Marrinan followed him. This collection, which brings together every issue and every short story the characters appeared in is a must, not only because it looks and reads great, but because the book is just as resonant now as it was eighteen years ago. In an era where the government is paying off columnists to pimp programs, you can’t help but read THE AMERICAN and realize that it is true: the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Thankfully, for this book, that’s a good thing. Something tells me that in 2023, this will feel as relevant as ever.

SIBAM?

This probably should have been a movie a long time ago. Now, of course, Verheiden is doing well for himself in Tinseltown and likely too smart to turn the property over to someone else, where it could easily get gutted. As his star grows, hopefully he’ll be fortunate enough to have the clout to oversee any film adaptation of the material so that it will retain the sharp edge that makes it special. The only sad thing is that Brendan Fraser, who would have been perfect as The American, is getting a bit too old for the part. But there’s never a short supply of young, good looking guys flooding casting agents’ offices, so maybe one day, somewhere down the road, the pieces will fall into place and the project will finally happen.

DEMO
Written by Brian Wood and Drawn by Becky Cloonan
Published by AiT/PlanetLar

This large and tidy collection brings together all twelve issues of the hit miniseries for posterity. Wood and Cloonan’s tales of young folks with special powers and abilities in a world that feels all too brutally real reads just fine in collected form, even though the chapters focus on someone new each time. The standout for me remains “Girl You Want,” a story about a young girl whose appearance changes depending on who is looking at her. Her identity-less life seems never-ending until she meets a waitress who only sees her true face, and then she becomes as obsessed with finding love with the girl that she begins to mirror the actions of those who have bedeviled her for years. The story works on so many levels, as do many of the tales in the book, making this a very satisfying book. Extra kudos go to Cloonan, who does simply amazing work in adapting her art style with each chapter to fit the characters and situations involved. You’d swear that there were pages drawn by a manga artist, or Paul Pope, or Christine Norrie, but it’s all her, show dynamic versatility. Good stuff.

COLONIA VOL.2
Written and Drawn by Jeff Nicholson
Published by AiT/PlanetLar

Nicholson’s saga of a young boy and his two uncles magically transported to an alternate earth continues in this whimsical and light-hearted second volume. Young Jack must now not only contend with his talking, golden egg-laying duck, but also the affections of a classic “farmer’s daughter” who has actual knowledge of how the trio wound up in this universe to begin with. Plus, there are still pirates, mermaids posing as bar wenches, beings made entirely of fishes, and Rip Van Winkle to deal with.

COLONIA, like ELECTRIC GIRL, is something of an event comic, as Nicholson is a busy fellow who only has so much time to devote to the book. But when he does get as issue together, it is jam-packed with a lot of story and fun. Bringing together six issues, as this collection does, means you have a very healthy reading experience ahead of you when you sit down with the book. And when the reading is this much fun, so much the better. Like ELECTRIC GIRL, you wish that you’d be able to get more story with higher frequency, but the end results are so good that you’re happy with what you get. Hurry back, Jeff. We’ll be waiting.

ZOMBIE TALES: DEATH VALLEY #1
Written by Andrew Cosby and Johanna Stokes and Drawn by Rhoald Marcellus
Published by Boom Studios

This latest ZOMBIE effort from the Boom umbrella is more or less a direct homage to the cult-classic flick NIGHT OF THE COMET. Now, nothing makes me happier while thinking about my teenage years than thinking about my secret girlfriend Catherine Mary Stewart, so I’m not going to nitpick about that; what I am going to say is that I hope the book stretches itself away from that homage/comparison with its conclusion next issue. What is here, homage or not, is reasonably zippy: a collection of high school kids straight out of John Hughes’ casting couch (the jock, the dweeb, the hot girl, the alt chick, etc.) are trapped in a basement when some sort of solar event causes the rest of the world to be killed and resurrected and begin walking the Earth looking for flesh to eat. Artistically, there’s an odd disconnect between Marcellus’ neo-cartoony style and the gore and graphic violence that crops up. Not the best or the worst we’ve seen from the series; the last issue will truly tell the tale.

DEAD@ 17: ROUGH CUT VOL.3
Written and Drawn by Various
Published by Viper Comics

ROUGH CUT has generally existed as a way for other creators to work with Josh Howard’s DEAD mythology and have their own fun and for Howard himself to fill in some blanks in his own story. Now, however, it seems to have a different purpose, which is to expand the DEAD universe a bit more, particularly as the series itself has a new entry (PROTECTORATE) with all new characters. Now we get stories of not only Nara, but of others along the line of girls risen from the grave as protectors. The best efforts come from RANDOM ENCOUNTER’S Nicc Balce and from Howard working with Raven Gregory as we begin to get a bit more deeply involved with a young girl named Asia who would appear to soon be Nara’s direct successor in her heavenly mission. Howard’s work looks tighter and more focused in black and white, and Balce’s stuff, an odd Ameri-manga style, looks great. Nothing Earth-shattering here, but solid stuff that works well in the DEAD line.

LOVE AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE VOL.4
Written by J. Torres and Drawn by Eric Kim
Published by Oni Press

LOVE charmed me immensely, right from the first scene. Joel, who has chosen to teach English in Korea (even though he doesn’t speak the language and doesn’t like the crowds), is comparing himself to the Twilight Zone character that survives the nuclear war to read all the books he wants but breaks his glasses. Joel himself is a comic geek, living in a city full of comic shops everywhere, but none of the books are in English. It’s cute stuff, and only the first of moments that will make you smile in this terrific little book.

Joel’s problems are compounded by the huge crush he has on the secretary of the school where he teaches, but the language barrier, along with his natural shyness, prevent him from attempting to make a move.

The script is fun and lively, the art is note perfect… the only thing I didn’t like about LOVE is that I haven’t read the first three volumes. This is a book that you can easily share with a non-comics reader, and they’ll enjoy it. Check it out.

DORK TOWER VOL.1 AND VOL.8
Written and Drawn by John Kovalic
Published by Dork Storm

John Kovalic’s geek masterpiece gets a brand new collection, along with a fifth printing of volume one, proving once again that perseverance and hard work do pay off over time. Plus, reading these two volumes separately, you also get a good look at how versatile the book and its characters are.

Volume 8 is a collection of material from the Dork Tower website and other web spots, and the focus of these strips isn’t so much on the characters but on the gags. This strips are heavily laced with material on the pop culture of the time and don’t have to spend time on character arc and development. Plus, Kovalic can take the time to do brilliant one-panel gags like “The Fairly Goth Parents” a hilarious homage to the great cartoon. Volume 1, which reprints comics from the regular series, has a stronger focus on the characters and how they live in their geek obsessed world. There’s character growth and development, and the seeds are planted very early for moments that will pay off far down the road. The book still has plenty of basic gags, but it’s a bit more substantive.

One thing that never changes is Kovalic’s art, which looks a little rougher in volume one, but is still basically what you’re going to see in volume eight. He had a strong idea from the start how the cast was supposed to look, and he’s stuck with it. With the reprint of volume one, it’s the perfect time to jump on board and give the book a try if you’ve been thinking about it.

COMPLETE OMAHA THE CAT DANCER VOL.1
Written by Kate Worley and Reed Waller and Drawn by Waller
Published by Amerotica/NBM

Maybe the best-known work of explicit erotica to ever hit the comics mainstream, OMAHA is finally getting the collection treatment. OMAHA, with its graphic treatment of sexuality between its furry characters, became one of the books that would eventually lead to the creation of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. However, this book was so much more than that; it was also an entertaining drama about Omaha’s life, not just as a stripper, but as a young woman trying to make her way in a world of sex and drama.

Even then, the book had far more reaching implications that just that. Many writers and artists took some inspiration from the book, even if they didn’t go with the more explicit route that OMAHA did. Without this book, I doubt you’d see, maybe, a STRANGERS IN PARADISE or even some of the more exotic elements in SANDMAN. Someone always has to lead the way in each revolution, and this book was surely at the front in its time.

The collection is put together nicely, printing on a larger paper size, allowing the nuances in the art plenty of room to breathe. It makes a fine, shame-free addition to the shelf of any person serious about the medium and the first amendment.

TRAILERS
Written by Mark Kneece and Drawn by Julie Collins-Rousseau
Published by NBM

TRAILERS is the story of a young man being pushed closer and closer to his breaking point. Josh’s mom is a drug dealer and a prostitute, which he remains in complete denial about. But part of denial must end immediately when his mother takes a baseball bat and kills the man who supplies her drugs, and Josh is charged with keeping the family together (he has younger siblings) by disposing of the body. From there he begins a descent into paranoia and nervous breakdown, as his mother’s habits become worse, a drug dealer steps in the replace the last one, and one of Josh’s neighbors, a boy his own age whom he considered a friend, begins sleeping with his mother. And in the meantime, he has to try and manage his own life, which he might actually be close to developing.

Part of TRAILERS really works, and parts of it fall very flat as you watch Josh flounder through his life. He is young, and very naïve, but it becomes difficult to accept his lethargy in admitting what is truly going on around him, especially as his younger siblings begin to feel the toll of their mother’s wrongdoings. His inability to act makes it difficult to care, and Kneece loses the reader a couple of times. But he manages to write his way to a strong conclusion, albeit one that should have happened about forty pages before it did. Aiding the proceedings nicely is the work of Collins-Rousseau. Her characters are strong in their ugliness, and her ability to set the scene is excellent. I’d have liked to see a tighter book, but overall, this is a reasonable success.

SMOKE
Written by Alex de Campi and Drawn by Igor Kordey
Published by IDW

SMOKE, set in a futuristic London run by a morally and financially bankrupt government, is the story of Cain, an assassin employed by that government who suddenly finds himself on the outside looking in, thanks to the death of his mentor. Standing in his way? More assassins, a terrorist group of women demanding full-body plastic surgery, a man who has no face of his own, and his mentor’s daughter… whom he abandoned three years ago but still loves.

There’s plenty more to the story than that, but trying to explain the complex and labyrinthine plot would honestly make my hangover feel much worse. So take my word for it that it keeps you on your toes as you do your best to follow the double crosses, gun fights, and car chases.

The book’s best asset is Kordey, long removed from the forced horrors of working on X-MEN, he delivers the goods here, depicting de Campi’s London as if he had lived in it for twenty years. His people are drawn with a maximum of detail and personality, and they keep your eye riveted to the page. It’s gorgeous to look at. While de Campi’s story is very good, and her plotting is solid, her dialogue reads a little flat on the page. This is fairly normal for a young writer, as that’s a skill that develops over the course of a career, so it’s nothing to sweat over. SMOKE is an entertaining read, without snappy patter, and was an interesting risk on IDW’S part that I think showed some good results.

REMINDER!

Review-A-Day Month continues over at The Comics Waiting Room. Please click the link down below and check it out! Next week: 10 essential comics for 2005!

See you in seven.

Review materials may be sent to: Marc Mason, P.O. Box 26732, Tempe, AZ 85285. You can also find me at Happy Nonsense and The Comics Waiting Room

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