Charismagic #1 – Review

By: Vince Hernandez (writer), Khary Randolph (artist), Emilio Lopez (colorist)

The Story: The most evil and dangerous criminal magician is about to escape, and you know what that means?  Pulped apples!

The Review: What makes for a compelling first issue, one that will keep you invested to see how the first arc goes?  Well, pretty much the same things that make compelling second, third, and all issues that come after: engaging characters, appealing art, and fresh storylines.  The only real difference is you have to hit the ground running—you don’t have the luxury to offer a weak, or even a mediocre issue; the series’ livelihood is at stake.

Charismagic #1 establishes the right tone by clearly showing it knows what it wants to be and where it’s going.  Having spoken before on the importance of setting some ground rules for magic (however tenuous and breakable they may be), I’m glad they delve into some magical physics right from the get-go.  Even better, the way magic exists in this world ties into the threat to come, so from the beginning you know what’s at stake for the characters.

The cost is a long, doom-ridden, explanatory monologue, which is an old fictional tool, but one that really drains the pacing in comics.  Hector’s rambling warning tells straight out the danger ahead, but it also feels leaden and awkward, so it doesn’t all work.  When he tries to make a point by crushing that apple, it comes off unavoidably melodramatic.  But it gets the expository stuff out of the way pretty effectively, saving future issues from having to deal with it.  It’d have been nice to see how magic works prior to shaking things up, however.

What’s nice about Zatara-analogue Hank’s conversation with alcoholic, magic-knowledgeable Hector is the dialogue flows naturally, showing the characters already have some history in place.  Hernandez gets across the subtext of their interactions so well (helped by the occasional, revealing thought bubble) that you get a good sense of their relationships without having them spelled out to you.  Even the spats between Hank and girlfriend/showgirl Alle have layers—despite their irritation, they still possess a degree of caring and empathy for each other.

Lady Mechanika #1 – Review

By: Joe Benitez (writer and artist), Peter Steigerwald (colors), John Reed (letters) & Vince Hernandez (editor)

The Story: We are introduced to Lady Mechanika, a half-human, half-mechanical woman who is trying to learn about her past.

What’s Good: This issue was really good all over.  The story mostly just lays the groundwork.  We are introduced to Mechanika: The City of Tomorrow.  Mechanika is kind of a steam-punk metropolis in Britain during the late 1800’s.  I guess the story said it was in the “British Commonwealth”, but that is picking nits.  We pick up the story by seeing a teenage girl who is half-human/half-mechanical running from some goons who work for a nefarious (and nameless) overboss.  She gets away and finds her way to Mechanika where we meet Lady Mechanika herself.  Lady Mechanika is a kind of noir-ish adventure heroine who is half-mechanical herself.  Although she goes on adventures to kill werewolves and the like, she is mostly driven to find out who made her the way she is and why.  Naturally, this will bring her into conflict with the nameless overboss, but that will be a story for a later issue.

Benitez walks the tightrope of giving us just enough information to keep the issue interesting while not telling us the whole story and he does it well.  There is a lot of mystery here and you want to learn more, not only about the Lady, but about the world she lives in.