Twilight Zone #1 – Review

By: J. Michael Straczynski (writer), Guiu Vilanova (illustrator), Vinicius Andrade (colorist)

The Story: We all know that money can buy power, but can it buy freedom?

The Review: Happy New Year, everyone, and what a fine time for a new Twilight Zone comic. Clearly Dynamite has high hopes for this series, having handed the reins to Twilight Zone veteran, J. Michael Straczynski. Even so he’ll have his work cut out for him, The Twilight Zone has quite a lofty reputation and not without reason.

Straczynski does an admirable job of recreating the tone of the classic series.  His ‘opening,’ as it were, is a spot-on evolution of Serling’s narration, adjusted for the modern day. It hardly stops there, J.M.S. provides an old-fashioned, yet suitably topical, premise for his story; a smarmy financial shark seeks to escape his life with the help of a mysterious firm specializing in new identities.

The issue’s priority bounces back and forth between establishing tone and exposition in a manner that is, admittedly, somewhat awkward, but generally does so with sufficient charm to pull itself through. The larger than life professions of the characters help to smooth out the script’s tendency towards verbosity and theatrics. It would be strange to hear lines like this in everyday life, but our subject’s pomposity makes it believable and Straczynski’s talent makes it enjoyable. There’s an attention to lyricism, stops, and starts in the dialogue that reminds that this series is based on the brainchild of a playwright. “What about love,” one character asks our subject, “Is there anyone special in your life?” “Yes. Natalie,” he responds, “Beautiful, vacuous Natalie. Hold her to your ear and you can hear the sea.” That line makes me smirk each time I read it, particularly as its narrator grows more and more unreliable.