Incorruptible #22 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Marcio Takara (art), Nolan Woodard (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters) & Shannon Watters

The Story: Max Damage finishes his building project and faces a old-time enemy.

What’s Good: SPOILER WARNING…      Plutonian finally shows up at the ending of this issue.  It’s taken a long time for us to get to this point (almost 2 years) but it was high time we saw this interaction between the hero-gone-bad and the bad-guy-made-good, even if I can even understand why it took so long.  Whereas it was pretty easy to show the concept of a hero going to the dark side (just show him killing innocent civilians), it is much harder for a writer to demonstrate that a villain has really become the good guy: saving one little old lady isn’t going to cut it.  Max Damage has been on quite a journey over the last couple of years and it’ll be interesting to see how this next phase of his life plays out.

And, that’s especially true now that a certain underage former female accomplice is back on the scene.  Having Jailbait back might be a real treat because Waid wrote her so well in the early issues.  We’ve seen Max’s moral absolutes be applied to just about everyone else around him, but will he be quite as fast to punish a character like Jailbait when he knows that she is really “his fault”?  Can’t wait to see that….

There’s a lot to look forward to in this book.

Incorruptible #21 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer/creator), Marcio Takara (artist), Nolan Woodard (colorist), Ed Dukeshire (letterer) & Matt Gagnon (editor)

The Story: Urban planning continues in Coalville.  Max is building something and a new villain shows up.

Review: This comic is well-written and pleasant to read, but it just lacks that zap that makes Irredeemable (its sister-title) a real treasure.  Whereas Irredeemable has global import with the Plutonian ravaging Earth and people dying by the thousands… Incorruptible just doesn’t have that same hook or scope.  Perhaps that is an issue with me wanting this comic to be one thing and Mark Waid just writing another, but I put down every issue of this and think, “Sheesh!  The stakes sure are small in this comic.”

The comic does feature a good story of redemption.  Max Damage could be seen like a recovering addict and if we were ever to forget that concept, pairing Max with Detective Armdale (who is a recovering alcoholic) reminds us.  Recovering addicts do weird things in their personal journeys to redemption because even though their friends want them to make amends for their lousy behavior, they can’t do that until they’ve made themselves healthy.  So, I do understand why it makes sense for Max to fixate on the salvation of Coalville, but at the same time, it doesn’t make for the most interesting comic to read.  It does make Incorruptible a fairly unique comic offering though and that’s to be applauded since I don’t think it makes any sense for a smaller publisher like Boom! to publish “normal” superhero stories that we could get at DC or Marvel.

Incorruptible #19 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer & creator), Marcio Takara (art), Nolan Woodard (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters), Shannon Watters (assistant editor) & Matt Gagnon (editor)

The Story: Max Damage continues trying to clean up Coalville, but it’s difficult with all the super-villains seemingly finding haven there.

What’s Good: Okay, this is more like it.  I’d been a little tough on the last few issues of Incorruptible as the story had settled into an arc that was a little dull about Max helping to rebuild the town of Coalville (which I still say is a dreadful name).  I mean, who wants to read a comic book about urban blight?

Well, this issue does continue that story arc, but it also brings back some of the more twisted elements that make Incorruptible (and its sister title Irredeemable) worth reading.  This comic excels when it does things that Marvel and DC couldn’t get away with.  So, in this issue there is a particular scene where the Coalville police come upon a few super-villains who are up to super-villainous stuff.  One of the villains has the power to freeze people in time, so she freezes the cops and says (paraphrasing), “There!  Now we can get back to what we were doing.” and as she returns to her work, one of the other villains just chops the cops’ heads off.  Then in a later scene, there is a character that has been cultivated for a bit to have an ongoing role in Incorruptible who gets his heart ripped out by another villain.

The point is not so much that “violence is cool,” but that this comic needs to do things that Marvel and DC would cringe from a little bit. Otherwise it is just another superhero book.  And, to be clear, the violence isn’t gross or over the top — this comic isn’t Crossed or anything exploitative like that — it’s just nice to see a comic that is pushing the boundaries in the effort to tell a story.

Incorruptible #18 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer & creator), Marcio Takara (art), Nolan Woodard (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters), Shannon Watters (assistant editor) & Matt Gagnon (editor)

The Story: Max Damage tries to help Coalville rebuild from the damage inflicted by Plutonian’s rampage, but not everyone is so eager for this to happen.

What’s Good: The supporting characters in this story have always been more interesting than our main character Max Damage, and that continues in this issue (and is also one of the problems for the series).  One of the stories in this issue is that Max has located a “one honest man” who can bring order to Coalville, but he needs his cop-buddy Armadale to talk to the guy.  The entirety of Incorruptible is about redemption and Armadale (the recovering alcoholic police officer) is pretty relatable, so your heart kinda breaks for the guy when you see that at first Armadale thinks that Max wants Armadale to lead the Coalville recovery.  Then, you see him being disappointed/irritated when he learns that Max really meant for someone else to get the job—because ya know, Armadale used to be a drunk.  In Max’s eyes, Armadale hasn’t done enough to redeem himself yet.

Of course, what does that mean for Max himself?  A problem this series has lived with since the first issue is that we’ve constantly been told what a horrible villain Max Damage was before he decided to become a hero.  But, this is comics and we need to be shown.  This issue takes a first step towards letting us know about one particularly awful thing that Max did during his villainous days.  Although, I still think we need the “all evil flashback issue”.

Incorruptible #15 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Marcio Takara (art), Nolan Woodard (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters) & Matt Gagnon (editor)

The Story: Max Damage battles the Paradigm OR No body is going to tell Hardcase what to do!

What’s Good: This is very much a transitional issue as Max Damage completes his journey from villain to anti-hero (who exists only to undo the Plutonian) to full-fledged hero who is interested in helping the common people.  One of things that bugged me at the end of last issue when the Paradigm (this comic universe’s answer to the JLA) shows up to fight Max is that over in Irredeemable, they have been granting amnesty to all sorts of nasty villains if they will only help with the global rebuilding effort (now that the Plutonian has been kidnapped by aliens).  That “inconsistency” gets resolved pretty fast in this issue and in a way that is very much in character for both Max and Cary/The Survivor (from Irredeemable).

Waid continues to make the women around Max much more interesting than Max himself.  His current sidekick Anne/Hardcase is a grade-A nutter due to losing her family and has been seeking solace in her role as Hardcase.  However, she has no powers and that makes superhero work pretty dangerous for her.  Does Max or the Paradigm have the right to tell Annie that she can’t be a hero?  Who decides who gets to be a hero?

All of this runs up to a pretty shocking end.  I don’t want to spoil it, but you’ll be caught by surprise.  You’ll be 99% sure that one thing will happen, but something very different will occur.  Can’t wait to see what happens next!

I continue to enjoy Marcio Takara’s art on this series.  Ever since he took over art duties 5-6 issues ago, it has really stabilized this series (after a LOT of artistic bouncing around in early issues).  I’d call his style: cartoony-realism.  It isn’t as cartoony as something you’d see from someone like Chris Bachalo or as realistic as someone like Steve Epting.  It is also very clean and straightforward.  Very much an example of knowing what lines are important on the page.

Incorruptible #14 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Marcio Takara (art), Nolan Woodard (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters) & Matt Gagnon (editor)

The Story: With Plutonian kidnapped by aliens (from the pages of Irredeemable), does Max Damage have a reason to be good anymore?

What’s Good: There is a lot of good character work in this issue.  The town of Coalville is having an impromptu street party as the news of Plutonian’s downfall sweeps the world.  Anna decides to go have a good time and be a party girl.  Alanah has guilt issues to deal with.  Armdale has his sobriety challenged.  And….everyone wonders if Max will still have a purpose now that Plutonian has been kidnapped by aliens.

Just to set the stage, Max was one of the world’s A-list villains and supposedly the only dude who could go toe-to-toe with Plutonian.  Yet, he was so horrified by the wanton destruction when Plutonian went evil and started destroying entire cities of normal folks that he turned good.  While his stated goal was to do something about Plutonian, the comic has never felt like it was headed in that direction if only because there was no confrontation between the two.  Plutonian wasn’t that hard to find, so if Waid had wanted that conflict to happen it would have been easy to engineer it.

What I like is that Max is truly born again hard (as the drill sergeant in Full Metal Jacket would have said).  He is a hero now and demonstrates that by taking down some 2-bit bad guy he spots in the crowd.  But what is really cool is that the Paradigm (the JLA-like heroes from Irredeemable) makes an appearance right at the end.  It is a bit of a SPOILER, but by having the Paradigm (esp. Survivor) attack Max, you can see that Waid wants to continue to play with this concept of what it means to be good.  Can Max’s past atrocities be forgiven because he has been good for the past few weeks?  Is Survivor doing a noble thing by trying to force Max to pay for his past crimes or should he allow a new hero to help out since much of the world has been destroyed by the Plutonian?

The whole thing reminds me of the Trial of Magneto back in Uncanny X-Men #200.  But, it really is something that superhero comics should explore more often.  Why is Wolverine never held to account for all the times he’s gone nuts and killed people?  What about Daredevil’s actions in Shadowland?  By going down this path, Waid is continuing to keep his stories unique in the superhero genre and that is smart because Marvel/DC already produce MORE than enough “standard” superhero fare.

The art is perfectly fine.  I’m not going to rave about it and say that it is the greatest thing ever, because it isn’t.  But I also never lingered over a panel and thought how screwed-up someone’s face looked or how awful the backgrounds were.  That in itself is actually a compliment.  If art can’t be awesome (and Boom seems to not like their artists to be too experimental), sometimes it is good to just “not be noticed” as you’re reading the story.  Takara has a very good handle on his storytelling and I hope he keeps it up.

Incorruptible #13 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer & creator), Marcio Takara (art), Nolan Woodard (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters) & Matt Gagnon (editor)

The Story: We follow Max, Alanah & Annie as they have some downtime after stopping the white-supremacist train-of-death in the last issue.

What’s Good: This issue has a lot of nice little character moments for the two women in Max’s life.  They are continuing to be the most interesting characters in this series and I really like the direction that Mark Waid is taking Annie (a.k.a. Hardcase).  After being just kind of a helper in the past stories, we learn that she is now going out on patrol along (kinda like Kick-Ass) and tangling with criminals and minor super-villains.  In some ways, she is developing a Bruce Wayne-type obsession with crimefighting and I think that will make for a lot of interesting stories in the future.

Waid also spends a lot of time in this issue (and this series) examining the nature of change.  We have the alcoholic cop who has remarked at the need to make uncompromising rules when changing personal behavior, but we also have Max and Annie who both changed their lives completely and suddenly.  It some ways it is a very accurate depiction of how people change their lives (although it is missing some of the internal conflict, bargaining, etc. that usually precedes such a change).

We’re also starting to do some things that make Max more interesting.  Did you know that he’s a super genius?  I sure didn’t, but he’s scribbling all over the walls like Reed Richards.  And I love this aspect of his character where he gets weird and annoying, as he’s been awake for days.  It makes Max much more interesting.

Takara’s art gets a little loose and soft in places for me (the opening scene with Alanah at the therapist’s office), but is generally very good.  And, I think his more cartooning style works for this book as long as Waid keeps a humorous undercurrent in the title.

Incorruptible #12 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Marcio Takara (art), Nolan Woodard (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters) & Matt Gagnon (editor)

The Story: Max Damage has to perform his first heroic public act: Save the city of Coalville from a nuclear weapon.

What’s Good: One of the central teases for this series when it launched last year was that it was supposed to be the mirror image of Irredeemable.  If Irredeemable shows what happens when the hero goes bad, Incorruptible was supposed to show what happens when the bad-guy takes a heroic turn.  For that story to work, we needed to see the hero (Max Damage) actually do something heroic on a large scale.  So even though this story-arc (where the city of “Coalville” is threatened with destruction by a nuclear bomb in a train) hasn’t been that inspired, we needed to see this heroic act from Max so that he isn’t simply a counter-point to the Plutonian.

In a lot of ways, the Irredeemable/Incorruptible world is basically a post-apocalyptic setting, so all the kinds of things that happen in other comics that are favorites in any zombie or dystopian-future story make sense here.  You would absolutely see the rise of insane people doing bad things and the common people need someone like Max to look out for them.

Incorruptible #11 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Marcio Takara (art), Nolan Woodard (colors) & Ed Dukeshire (letters)

The Story: Max Damage continues trying to thwart the Diamond Gang’s attempt to blow up Coalville with a mega-weapon.

What’s Good: We get a very positive art change on this title!  Incorruptible has been struggling to find its footing from an artistic standpoint every since it launched last winter.  The art started out being “not great”, then changed art teams around issue #5 to art that was “good”, but didn’t quite fit the tone of the book.  This is the art look that Boom! and Mark Waid should have been looking for.  Takara’s look has a very fine, thin line that really works nicely because it allows for the characters to appear more dynamic.  Characters that look like cardboard cut-outs have plagued this title.  Combine the new look with his “normal” anatomy study and we have a winner!

There is also a change on colors as we switch to a much more muted color palette.  It is a nice change from the bold reds that we had before.  Incorruptible takes place in a wasteland, so it is appropriate that it would not be a colorful place since everything is so dusty.

As for the story, it is very serviceable.  That may sound like a bad thing, but you cannot have mind-blowing, “holy crap” moments in every issue of a comic (at least not one that you want to persist for more than 4-5 issues).  What is nice here is that we are finally having Max Damage on a mission of sorts.  Before this threat to Coalville, the entire series had been a soap-opera with Max juggling his sidekicks.  That was good, but considering that the hook of the series is “bad guy turns hero” we need to see him actually do something heroic.  Well….this is that story.

Incorruptible #10 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer/creator), Horacio Domingues (pencils), Juan Castro & Michael Babinski (inks), Nolan Woodard (colors) & Ed Dukeshire (letters)

The Story: Max Damage and sidekick confront a group of white supremacists inspired by the Plutonian.

What’s Good: For a series that is supposed to be about Max Damage, it is interesting that the most interesting characters are the young women in his life.  So it was welcome this month to see that Annie, the “new” Jailbait, gets her own nickname: Hardcase.  Of course it makes the job of the lowly comics reviewer easier to not have to refer to new/old Jailbaits but it also helps to establish Annie as her own character.  It also seems to settle whether Annie will be remaining as a character.

It is also a very positive sign that Waid has added the Plutonian’s former girlfriend, Alana Patel, to Max’s entourage.  Waid has shown a few deft hand at dealing with emotionally damaged young women in this series, so this should be fertile ground for him to work in for future issues.

Incorruptible #9 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Horacio Domingues (art), Juan Castro (inks), Andrew Dalhouse (colors) & Ed Dukeshire (letters)

The Story: A well done jumping on point allows us to learn some additional background info on several of our central characters.

What’s Good: If you’re a fan of “jumping on points” this will be a good issue for you.  Mark Waid does a very nice job of balancing the summary-of-the-story-so-far aspects of a jumping on point issue with the unveiling of additional information that is necessary to keep established readers from screaming.  He does this really well by using flashbacks and it makes me wonder why jumping on point issues can’t always be this way.

I also really like what Waid is doing with the Jailbait 2.0 character.  The original Jailbait is a great character and is easy to root for: she’s just a kid who has made some poor choices and you really want to see her straighten her life out or at least catch a break.  However, having original Jailbait around makes Max Damage’s history of sleeping with this 15-16 year old girl a little too blatant.  Your tastes may vary and I do appreciate that this history of pedophilia is important if we are to appreciate Max Damage’s ultimate redemption, but I still don’t like to see the living, breathing victim on every page.  It’s just a little too skeevy so I am happy that the new Jailbait 2.0 is becoming a more central character.

In terms of overall plot, Incorruptible is starting to actually feel like it might belong in the same universe with Irredeemable by showing Max’s looming confrontation with this cult that worships the Plutonian.  These blatant connections between the series have been kinda slow to materialize, but I finally feel that the events of this issue might set us up for a some kind of interaction between Max and the Plutonian.  [Although it wouldn’t hurt if Irredeemable could return the favor and at least mention Max as a legit threat to the Plutonian…]

Incorruptible #8 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Horacio Domingues (pencils), Juan Castro (inks), Andrew Dalhouse (colors) & Ed Dukeshire (letters)

The Story: After getting shot in the last issue, will Max Damage survive?  And what is the next chapter in the story of Jailbait?

What’s Good: I’ve been pretty unabashed in my love of the character Jailbait.  Waid really mixes things up nicely in this issue, giving us Jailbait 2.0 by bringing back the girl who Max had forced to play Jailbait a few issues ago.  It turns out that her family was murdered by a group of skinhead-like thugs who idolize the Plutonian and she is willing to play Jailbait if Max promises to keep her safe.

This whole Jailbait tale is really shaping up to be a fun and dramatic story.  Surely the original Jailbait isn’t going to be thrilled with this new development, so it looks like Max Damage is starting a collection of emotionally damaged young ladies.  In a way, I like the new Jailbait better because it is hard to think of Max as truly heroic when the original Jailbait was basically a walking, talking reminder of his past pedophilia.  Nothing heroic about pedophilia!

Incorruptible #7 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Horacio Domingues (pencils), Juan Castro (inks), Andrew Dalhouse (colors), Ed Dukeshire (letters)

The Story: More Jailbait fun and Max Damage begins to come into conflict with the Diamond Gang.

What’s Good: One thing that I love about Incorruptible (and its sister title, Irredeemable) is that they are not written in story arcs.  Each issue is “what happened next” and it reminds me of how comics were as a kid in the 1980’s before comics were written in arcs with each arc beginning some indeterminate time after the preceding arc (days? weeks? months?, who knows?).  This issue continues following the very compelling little tale of Jailbait, Max Damage’s 16-year old sidekick (nee, accomplice).  She’s a very compelling character who is really the moral center for the entire comic.  I guess that Max is technically the main character, but I find that I really don’t care about him very much.  Witness, he gets hurt pretty badly at the end of this issue and I don’t think I cared……but I was very curious about what happened to Jailbait after she snuck off.  I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of her because she is too good of a character to lose.  And, we even have a little bit of “Who will wear the leather tramp costume” action going on here as we see some cute young thing swipe Jailbait’s costume from her room.  I definitely want to know what is going on with that!

This comic is also neat in that it doesn’t spoon-feed everything to you.  After reading several pages of Max talking like he’s having a stroke, you realize that it’s simply because he hasn’t slept and his body is becoming hard as a brick (that’s his power).  But, Waid just allows this to happen organically during the issue and spares us any yawning or inner monologue that explains what is going on.

The art on this title is much improved.  I wouldn’t say it’s a book to buy for the art, but the art is no longer holding this title back.

Incorruptible #6 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Horacio Domingues (art), Juan Castro (inks), Andrew Dalhouse (colors) & Ed Dukeshire (letters)

The Story: Will Max Damage compromise his new (very new) superhero ideals to save Jailbait?

What’s Good: For those who have followed Incorruptible since issue #1, it hasn’t been 100% clear what kind of hero Max Damage would turn into.  Is he going to be a Captain American-type boy scout?  Or is he going to be some kind of murkier hero like someone from the Thunderbolts or Suicide Squad?

When we last left this story in issue #5, Jailbait (Max’s underage sex-toy from his criminal days) had been kidnapped and the bad guys were starting to mail her to him piece-by-piece (a finger first).  What lengths would Max go to in order to save Jailbait?

I like the turn that Waid gives Max.  He’s going to be a no compromises hero; there will be no negotiating with criminals or terrorists.  This works really well considering that Incorruptible is a mirror to Irredeemable.  Just as the Plutonian has gone from being Superman to a twisted, perverted mass-murderer, it makes sense that Max (who kept a 16 year old as a sex-toy) would become a boy scout.  I also like this direction because it will set up a constant struggle for Max to toe the line.  Honestly, if Max had just morphed into some kind of anti-hero, you could have made the case that he hadn’t really changed at all…

Waid is also doing a lovely job of making Jailbait the emotional core of this series.  As we learn more about her character, we’re seeing that she is just a really screwed up kid.  Max was kinda all she had in the world and she is going through a bit of an identity crisis now that Max isn’t consorting with 16 year olds.  Didn’t we all know some girl in high school who had a heart of gold, but was a bit too easy because she had really low self-esteem and a lousy father?  Didn’t you just want to shake her and say, “Honey, this is not the way to make yourself happy!”  Jailbait is that girl.

From a story-development standpoint, Waid finally gets the car in gear and it is time.  The whole series, I’d wondered when we would be done (at least mostly done) with the character development and start seeing Max do some superhero stuff.  It looks like that is about to get started.

Incorruptible #5 – Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Horacio Domingues (art), Andrew Dalhouse (colors) & Ed Dukeshire (letters)

The Story: What exactly is the nature of Max Damage’s relationship with Jailbait?

What’s Good: The first thing you notice when you open this comic is that we’ve got a new artist.  The art for this series has really held it back and this art by Horacio Domingues is an immediate improvement.  It’s not perfect (as I’ll discuss below), but these characters look like living organisms and not cardboard cutouts that have been posed (which we had in the first 4 issues).

Not surprisingly, art that makes you feel like these are real characters leads to the best issue of this series so far.  Anyone who has read this series from the beginning has wondered what is the deal with Jailbait.  When Max Damage was a bad guy, you “knew” what she was for.  But now that he’s reforming himself, what is she going to do?  She has no powers and you kind of wonder why he doesn’t send her home since going on missions is kinda dangerous.

Waid shows us in this issue why Damage is keeping her around.  What I like about this series and it’s sister series, Irredeemable, is that they really explore the darker side of heroes/villains.  Turns out that the reason …[SPOILER]… Damage keeps Jailbait around is that he’s protecting her.  The man has a lot of enemies…and they’re not all superheroes.  Some of them are nasty and depraved villains.  So, when Jailbait gets angry at Damage in the last issue and stomps off, she is suddenly very vulnerable.

Irredeemable Special #1 – Advance Review

By: Mark Waid (writer), Paul Azaceta (art, Story A), Matthew Wilson (colors, Story A), Emma Rios (art, Story B), Alfred Rockefeller (colors, Story B), Howard Chaykin (art, Story C), Andrew Dalhouse (colors, Story C), Ed Dukeshire (letters)

This Irredeemable special serves as an anthology, made up of three three short stories from the Irredeemable Universe. All three of the shorts are enjoyable, and for my money, the first story (“Hornet”) is the real winner here.  Anyone who has been reading Irredeemable since the beginning remembers that first scene of the title where Plutonian fries one of his hero buddies along with the hero’s wife and young child.  It was a graphic and memorable scene that set the tone.  “Hornet” adds some extra color to that scene and makes it even more terrible that Plutonian killed the guy and his family.  What I find impressive is that Waid clearly has a lot of story already planned because I doubt this is the sort of short story he could have whipped up on the fly.