Artist: Travel Foreman, Dan Green
Publisher: DC Comics
Release Date: September 7th 2011
Reviewed by: Steve Aryan
Publisher: DC Comics
Release Date: September 7th 2011
Reviewed by: Steve Aryan
Buddy Baker has gone from "super" man to family man – but is he strong enough to hold his family together when Maxine, his young daughter, starts to manifest her own dangerous powers? Find out in this dramatic new series from writer Jeff Lemire and artist Travel Foreman.
Animal Man is not a typical superhero comic. The character itself has always been quite an odd one. A sort of cross between Manimal, without actually changing into the animals, Bravestarr (the space cop from the SF cartoon in the 1980s) and Vixen (another DC comic book character who can inherit the strengths of animals from a morphogenic field). Animal Man has been reinvented several times, and was at one time an eco-warrior fighting for animal rights, but one of the more recent incarnations made Animal Man much darker and it became almost a horror comic.
This new version borrows bits from all of his history, but this is definitely a supernatural horror comic that follows a superhero. He’s not someone who is new to the superhero game and from the first page intro, where the character is reading an article about himself and his varied career, even a new reader would appreciate his long and unusual history. What follows in issue 1 is a quick run through that shows you his family life, his powers and how they work, as well as setting up a mystery and ending on a creepy plot twist. There’s a lot packed in but it’s handled very well by the writer and anyone who is totally new to the character will be able to follow it. You don't have to read anything else to know what's going on.
I appreciate this comic will not be for everyone, because although it is a superhero comic, it doesn’t really fit into the mainstream and you can appreciate why Animal Man was a Vertigo comic at one time. I think it’s going to be a dark, creepy, edgy book, so I don’t see it being for kids really and although there might be some punching of crooks and he might stop a few crimes, that will not be the core of this book. It’s not Superman or Batman or Green Lantern. He wears a costume, but really he doesn’t need to and it's not a vital part of the character’s makeup.
The artist is an odd choice for me, because sometimes it looks stark and edgy and it works perfectly with the story, and at other times I just couldn’t get along with it at all. Overall this is a very unusual and dark superhero comic book and I am very keen to see where it goes next.
2 comments:
Me too. Very keen indeed.
I just adored Animal Man back in the Morrison/Milligan days, so it's a real pleasure to see the character back, and with the man behind the dark delicacies of Sweet Tooth in charge, I'm even hopeful. Would that he were only drawing it too...
Yeah it looks like it's going to be a really interesting series. Sweet Tooth is excellent, the art is deceptively simple and I just really enjoy the story, a great Vertigo title.
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