Drumheller #1 – Review

By: Alex Link (Story, script), Riley Rossmo (story, art, colors), Kelly Tindall (letters)

The Story: A guy who takes lots of hallucinogens teams up with an ex-girlfriend to do paranormal stuff.

Review: This comic is really trippy.  It’s about a guy who is slightly insane and takes a LOT of drugs.  There also seems to be a splash of the paranormal flitting about.  So, when the main character hears a voice coming from his bag of golf clubs or the mummified body he pulls out of a swamp starts to move, you can’t quite tell: Is this really happening or is it just a drug-induced hallucination.

And that’s really the hook of the first issue.  It’s all about that weird cross-over between hallucination and and reality.  There probably is a central “call to action” that is driving the plotline forward.  But – honestly – I read the comic two days ago and I don’t even remember what the story is all about.  The central story is really secondary to the weirdness.

That may make the comic sound shallow, but that kinda misses the point because the weirdness is so well done.  The opening scene shows the main character on a golf course, in a bathrobe getting struck by lightning.  Then he gets up and watches a peacock emerge from a rain puddle on the ground and fly away…..then he notices that the peacock (not a penHEN) has laid an egg in the puddle, so he picks it up and then sticks his face in the puddle and his face emerges from the puddle in the sky of another world where the sun is out.  It’s really trippy and weird.  It’s also the sort of thing that makes me appreciate comics as a medium.  You could write prose about this sort of scene, but it wouldn’t be graphic enough.  You could try to put such a scene in a movie or TV show, but it would almost certainly look like crappy CGI unless you spent a FORTUNE on the effects.  Comics are cool.

Of course, the thing selling all of this is Riley Rossmo’s art.  He just has a really good eye for atmosphere and the surreal.  He’s kinda done this sort of “edge of reality” story a bunch of times in Cowboy Ninja Viking, Green Wake and a few others.  He’s an exemplary artist and anything he does is worth checking out.  I still wish we’d get to see him do that raw, monochrome style from CNV and Proof again, but he seems to be going in a different direction.  I think his art loses something the more it is cleaned up and colored.

Dia De Los Muertos #1 – Review

Dead but Dreaming by: Alex Link (writer), Riley Rossmo (art) & Nick Johnson (colors)

Reflections by: Christopher E. Long (writer), Rossmo & Jean-Paul Csuka (art and colors)

Te vas Angel Mio by: Dirk Manning (writer), Rossmo (art) & Megan Wilson (colors)

The Story: An anthology revolving around the Mexican Day of the Dead.

Quick Review: Anthologies are always interesting: You take the “good” with the “meh” and hope that the parts you enjoy are enough to justify the price-tag ($4.99 in this case).  This issue has three tales involving the afterlife and it probably makes sense to touch on them in order….

Rebel Blood #2 – Review

By: Alex Link (plot/script), Riley Rossmo (plot/art) & Kelly Tindall (letters)

The Story: Trapped in the forest during an apocalypse, Chuck tries to make his way home.

Recap/Review: Good and bad with this comic.  Let’s be in a good mood and talk about the good stuff first, eh?

The general premise for this comic is interesting: man is out in the middle of nowhere when the apocalypse happens.  Usually when we see these end-of-the-world stories, we follow people who are trapped in cities or the suburbs.  It’s very different to see the world-ending from the standpoint of a guy located in a very remote location where he has limited information and already accepts that “the authorities” won’t be coming to help him.  Even in normal times, the deep wilderness has potential for scary times as anyone who has encountered an oddball stranger in the middle of the woods can tell you.  There’s no “help”…it’s all on YOU to get out of the jam.  So, the story and the setting work and make sense.

I also find myself enjoying the protagonist’s attempt to get home and find his family.  It seems like this apocalypse might actually be starting in the wilderness and making it’s way to the cities?  Thus, has to escape the mutant-filled forest and get to his family before the ghouls eat his family.  It isn’t a new concept, but the idea of not being able to help your children during a crisis is a powerful one and one that connects with readers.

Rebel Blood #1 – Review

By: Alex Link (plot/script), Riley Rossmo (plot/art) & Kelly Tindall (letters)

The Story: A man stuck in the wild tries to grapple with the onset of an apocalypse.

Review: This was pretty good.  The big attraction to this issue and series is artist Riley Rossmo.  He was incredible on Cowboy Ninja Viking back in 2010 and he has kept busy since then with Proof: Endangered and Green Wake.  I didn’t personally find the stories in Proof: Endangered or Green Wake to be very entertaining, so I was very happy to see Rossmo on a project that I might enjoy more.

The basic story in Rebel Blood is that of an apocalypse, but we see it through the eyes of a fireman who is working in the remote wilderness….hundreds of miles from civilization and his family.  So, this is kinda a different wrinkle.  One of the big attractions to an apocalypse story is the, “What happened?” aspect.  People who enjoy this genre understand that you usually are not given all the pieces to the puzzle, but find it fun to assemble the pieces that are present.  By telling the story in this remote way, “What happened?” is a much bigger question than usual.  All we know is that this guy is in a remote location and is being attacked by mutated animals.

The cousin of “What happened?” is “WTF is going on?” and this is a slightly different question in Rebel Blood.  Much of the information we see on the page is from various attempts the the protagonist makes to get home and save his family.  But, the catch is that each scene is different, with different family members dying in different scenes.  As a reader, there isn’t much indication of which scene was real……or if any of them are real.  For all the reader knows, these could be his mental imaginings of what he’ll discover when he goes to find his family or perhaps the guy has gone insane?  It’s really hard to know, but it adds to the sense of confusion that we feel… and that makes “What happened?” much more compelling.  Honestly…..this is a comic that can be enjoyed in a 10 minute read through, but also has some nuggets for a reader who wants to diligently analyze it panel by panel because I’m pretty sure the clues are all there.