Unknown Soldier #21 – Review

by Joshua Dysart (writer), Rick Veitch (art), Oscar Celestini (colors), and Clem Robins (letters)

The Story: The “life” of one AK-47 is followed from creation to present day.

What’s Good: In encapsulating the history of an AK-47, Dysart has to traverse quite a bit of time over the course of this one-shot.  The result is an issue that has a truly panoramic feel to it.  From decade to decade and period to period, Dysart’s script really manages to deliver the sense of time, and history, passing.  This makes the book feel big and fairly epic in its scope despite its focus on something mundane (a single rifle).

Dysart makes the surprising choice of having the gun itself narrate its history, which takes a little getting used to but is also a gamble that ultimately pays off in its sheer creativity.  The gun’s voice is an interesting one; it’s nuanced and complex enough to seem remarkably human, if cold.  It seems surprisingly adverse to slaughter and violence, feeling more content in its role as liberator or protector than as killer.  It also has what seems almost to be a touch of ego.  It appears irritated to be handled by children or used as a “starter gun” for a young boy.

This irritation also shows the gun’s unique ethics, or lack there of.  While it sounds mildly offended at being handled by children, this seems to be a purely professional issue, one totally unrelated to ethics.  Yet, of course, this contrasts wonderfully with the gun’s ideal use for itself, as a barely used tool of protection for an isolated farmer.  What results is a fascinatingly equivocal and contradictory.  The gun would prefer to be kept in peace, unfired, but has little problem with being involved in heinous violence.  Essentially, Dysart makes it clear that the gun’s morality does exist, if only in subtle flickerings, but is completely different from a human’s. This leads to a really great, self-deprecating ending for the issue where the gun reminds us of this very fact.

Veitch’s art is really enjoyable, as he does very well in maintaining the spirit of the series and the style established for it by Ponticelli.  Still, Veitch’s work provides a certain freshness for the series while providing it with an accessible, easier going feel.  He also makes great use of shadows and lighting, using both to get across the African landscape.  Veitch also shows an uncanny awareness of when best to remove a background and have a panel show its image against a blank color for dramatic effect.

Unknown Soldier #20 – Review

by Joshua Dysart (writer), Alberto Ponticelli (art), Oscar Celestini (colors), and Clem Robins (letters)

The Story: Moses and a beleaguered family make a last stand against the Karamojong cattle raiders.

What’s Good: With Unknown Soldier’s cancellation at issue #25, some big developments happen at the end of this issue that starts to set-up the series’ conclusion.  The most significant, and potentially the most disturbing, of these events is the final fate of Moses Lwanga’s personality, which has been battling for consciousness with the Unknown Soldier voice within his mind.  In typical fashion for this series, what happens is tragic, but also beautifully scripted by Dysart and rendered by Ponticelli.  What occurs physically on the page as Moses recedes is perfectly symbolic with what is occurring internally, there’s even a sense of suicide.  It’s very, very well done and I ended feeling a mix of disappointed, concerned, and saddened.

Most of the issue, however, sees Moses and a family of Karamojong desperately attempting to hold their ground against wave after wave of homicidal cattle raiders.  It’s rather neat seeing Dysart make use of military strategy, as Moses holds higher ground, positions his defenders, and attempts to predict the enemy’s attack patterns.  The trick Moses uses to get the family out is always rather clever; as one of the character’s points out, it’s the sort of ploy that one would see perpetrated by the tricksters of myth and folklore.

Unknown Soldier #18 – Review

by Joshua Dysart (writer), Alberto Ponticelli (art), Oscar Celestini (colors), and Clem Robins (letters)

The Story: As his mind continues to unravel, Moses prepares to make the trade: medicine for rifles.

What’s Good: All told, this is an astoundingly good issue of Unknown Soldier, effectively balancing Moses’ personal struggles with the more public, social issues at stake in Dysart’s comic, something that has probably been the biggest challenge for the series.  It does so through being an outstanding tragedy on both fronts.

With Moses, the sense of tragedy is bitterly disappointing; Dysart makes it hard not to feel bad for the guy.  I won’t spoil anything, but this month really gives off that classic “just when you think you’re out, they pull you back in” theme that great tragedy always strives for.  So much of the progress Moses thought he was making turns out to be an illusion, with the only question being to what extent.  Clearly, his consciousness is decaying and what’s worse is that Moses is apparently less aware and less able to control that deterioration than any of us thought.  Psychologically speaking, this is the lowest and most precarious he has ever been.  It’s horrifying, particularly when you realize the scope of these new introspective developments.

On a cultural level, Dysart gives us the sort of tragedy that is simply paralyzing, depressing even.  He says a lot both about the nature of humanity when desperation strikes, as well as the demons of superstition that haunt and madden the Acholi people.  As hope is lost, the people fall back to outrageous folklore, leading them to senseless bloodshed.  In many respects, they are driven to this due to their loss of hope, but their acts also lead to a loss of hope in the reader; it all seems so unpreventable and irreparable with the circumstances being what they are.

Dysart also effectively utilizes the theme of “man and boy.”  The relationship of Moses and Paul reaches its inevitable end this issue, and the resulting conversation between the two is easily one of the most memorable and touching moments of the book.  While emotional, it also plays up the themes of innocence vs. experience and the necessity of hope.  It is incredibly moving to see Moses speak of the death of hope in the IDP camp, only to attempt to instill hope in Paul, painting an image of normal life that looks like paradise. The dichotomy that Dysart has been setting up between Moses and Paul has never been more striking; one has a future, the other does not.

While Dysart works wonders this month, Ponticelli continues to amaze me since changing the style and direction of his art.  I adore this dusty, painted feel he’s been employing and feel that it makes the book look much more refined, polished, and high level.  The murky, less distinct nature of it also lends well to Moses’  increasingly confused mental state.