Resurrection Man #5 – Review

By: Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning (writers), Fernando Blanco (artist), Santi Arcas (colorist)

The Story: Don’t think of it as dying, Mitch—think of it as God asking you out on a date.

The Review: It’s been hard to take Resurrection Man seriously, both as a character and as a hero.  A lot of it has to do with his very conception.  I’ve said this before, but the idea of a hero who seemingly can’t die takes out half the tension of the story, and the fact that Mitch has no memory of who he is and thus no connections which can be threatened means another huge chunk of tension is lost as well.

And if most of the tension is gone, all you have left is a bunch of things happening without any feeling of investment in them.  I don’t know about you, but that’s how I feel about almost every plotline running through this series.  The stuff about Heaven and Hell fighting over Mitch’s soul has become so redundant, and with so little point, that you almost wish either one will finally get it in their grasp so as to introduce a little bit of conflict into the story.

The use of the Transhuman and Body Doubles also feels bland and empty.  The Body Doubles have added little to the title except for a little exposition and a lot of cheesecake, and the Transhuman, aside from a couple interesting beats, has offered even less.  This issue sees them doing almost nothing at all, and with Mitch out of the picture, they seem at a loss of what to do with themselves, other than futilely attacking Suriel (for revenge, I suppose?).

When I say Mitch is out of the picture, I mean he’s no longer active in the present story.  Obviously, with a title like Resurrection Man, it’d be a major misnomer if he actually managed to die for good in the fifth issue, so have no fear—he comes back.  And that’s exactly what I mean about the lack of tension.  When last issue ended with Suriel pouting that she might have killed him permanently this time, you knew that couldn’t possibly be true, so the fact Mitch comes back this time is no surprise at all.

Resurrection Man #4 – Review

By: Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning (writers), Fernando Dagnino (artist), Santi Arcas (colorist)

The Story: You know, he’s just as sick and tired of dying as you are of killing him.

The Review: The biggest problem with this series so far has been its relentless repetition.  Each issue has featured Mitch’s death and subsequent resurrection, a slice of cheesecake and violence from the Body Doubles, and some supernatural mumbo-jumbo from celestial forces either above or below.  This has made the title feel rote and predictable, a death mark for any ongoing series.

In a lot of ways, this issue continues to fill that tiresome mold, which needs to change, pronto.  Every scene features at least a couple characters mentioning points that DnA have already well established, whether it’s the Body Doubles on their resilience (“We’re posthuman.  Waaay beyond your crude cybernetic junk.  Waaaaay beyond.”) or Suriel on Mitch’s prized soul (“…so frighteningly overdue, so staggeringly mortgaged, the note has been passed up to the most extreme collection agency of all.”).

But this time around, we also get a few redeeming reveals that give the plot a bit of a kick.  The most important is Bonnie implying that Mitch and the Body Doubles were once possibly on the same side: “…I used to respect you.  For your work, and everything.”  And when Suriel later reveals that the Doubles work as “enforcers for one of the darkest sectors of America’s military-industrial complexes,” you can see how it connects to Mitch’s past military work, as recalled by Mr. Roth in #2.

Speaking of whom, another major twist in the story comes when Mr. Roth—or the Transhuman, as he’d prefer to be known—divulges the fact that his fancy-pants suit runs on his own life-force and that he’s actually “nineteen years old!”  While it’s not clear how DnA plan to incorporate this rather weird turn of events into the story, but at least it ensures the Transhuman will remain a fixture of this title for a while, until his aging problem gets resolved, one way or another.

Resurrection Man #2 – Review

By: Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning (writers), Fernando Dagnino (artist), Santi Arcas (colorist)

The Story: Getting chased by two hot ladies sounds pretty great in theory, and yet…

The Review: We don’t know too much about Mitch Shelley, the Resurrection Man, but in his defense, he doesn’t know too much about himself either.  It’s not the most unusual twist in the world when a comic book character knows more about his superpowers than his own past, but at least you’re never in want for mystery.  That said, the writers must take on the responsibility of keeping you interested if they want to keep you out of the loop.

One way to do that is to create a character who engages you with his personality alone, if not his background.  So far, you can’t say Mitch does much of that.  While not unlikable in any way, he just seems too buttoned-up and straight-laced to get very attached to his character.  At times, he becomes a cipher in his own comic, acting as instrument to deliver or acquire more information for us, but not actually doing much in particular.

The most we get to see of Mitch’s humanness (so to speak) is in the way he deals with Mr. Roth, a co-resident at the residential care home where Mitch’s dad spent his last days.  These scenes play very well, but mostly because Mr. Roth himself has such a lively personality of his own, being old-school bananas: “I was a super-villain.  Professional.  High tech end of the market.  They called me the Transhuman.  Maybe you heard of me?”  Mitch: “Ooo-kay.”

At least we glean a few interesting tidbits about Mitch’s past.  We learn he, like his father, was a scientist.  We know he used to work in corporate research, with ties to the government.  We also know that Mitch might have been something of a cold workaholic (Mr. Roth says, grinning, “You didn’t much give me the time of day, then, I recall.”).  From that we can take a few guesses as to a possible source of Mitch’s powers, but we don’t gain much more than that.