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| Friday, August 31, 2007 07:52 PM |
| The Take, Part One |
 by Fëanor |
StormWatch Vol. 1, #38-50; StormWatch Vol.2, #1-11; WildC.A.T.s/Aliens
[UPDATE: I forgot to mention one of my favorite things about the StormWatch series. There's a bar that all the superheroes go to that's called Clark's Bar. The owner and bartender, Clark, is very clearly meant to be Clark Kent/Superman, and in the background of the bar famous heroes and villains of DC and Marvel are often cavorting. Obviously they can't be referred to under their actual names, but that's clearly the Punisher grabbing the Joker in that one panel, and so forth. There's even some funny graffiti in one scene that refers to Clark and Lois. It's clever, funny, sort of self-referential in a way that I enjoy, and just adds to the atmosphere of the comic as a whole.]
When I mentioned to EverMike that I was planning on picking up The Authority Volume One TPB, he pointed out that I should really read Warren Ellis' run on StormWatch first, since it leads directly into The Authority. So, God bless him, he lent me the entire thing (well, minus one issue, but it doesn't appear to be an important one), and I read it. And it's pretty freaking fantastic.
StormWatch is a comic that I had never really heard of before that's set in the Image/Wildstorm universe. It follows an emergency response team that, in theory, works for the UN Special Security Council, although in practice they often do whatever the hell they want, for reasons that should become obvious. When something really messed up goes down, the UN invokes Code Perfect and calls in StormWatch, who send down one of a handful of small teams of superhero agents to take care of things. These agents are supported by a large, heavily-staffed, all-seeing, all-knowing orbital platform called SkyWatch, and everything is run from there by a commander known as the Weatherman. It's a great premise, and offers a really interesting and different conception of superheroes (essentially as international security agents), and it's mixed in with some spy stuff, international intrigue and politics, and all kinds of social and ethical issues. Of course, most of those political and ethical issues boil down to "America is really, really evil," but it still makes for great comics. And that's not to mention all the ridiculous, kick-ass, super-powered action, the dark humor, and the loads of cool ideas and great characters, many of which will be familiar to devotees of Ellis' work (I have a feeling Planetary Volume One will ring a lot more bells for me when I read it again, which I definitely intend to do soon).
One of my favorite characters is probably Jack Hawksmoor, a man who had a series of surgeries performed on him against his will since he was about 5, wherein alien organs were implanted him, causing him somehow to be sort of a city spirit, such that he can't live for very long outside of a city, but while inside of a city he can sort of commune with that city, reading what it's seen off its window panes, gaining strength and power from its energy, etc. It's a totally crazy idea for a superpower, but somehow it really works.
There are plenty of great little story arcs, too, as well as interesting one-shot stories, like the one which tells us the backstory of Jenny Sparks (who is the spirit of the 20th century, has power over all electricity, and can even turn into it). That particular book took the form of a series of very short stories, each one set in a particular period of time, and each one drawn in the style of that time period - golden age art for the '30s, silver age art for the '50s, etc. It was a little gimmicky, and the actual story was a bit weak, but it was still kind of fun, and Sparks is a great character.
Other story arcs were much stronger, such as the one that sets StormWatch up against a secret underground group of superhumans who intend to change the world by eliminating all authority and systems of control, and the one that introduces us to two characters who end up being central members of the Authority - Apollo and the Midnighter. The former story arc was particularly interesting because the group of superhumans that StormWatch find themselves fighting against aren't supervillains in the classic sense. Some of them are evil, or do evil things, but most are simply trying to do what's right in a different way. When they are finally defeated, the only thing you can really feel is a deep sense of tragedy that they couldn't have worked together to make the world a better place.
We also learn at the end of that story arc that (spoiler warning!!!) Weatherman Henry Bendix is actually a psychopath and has been using StormWatch to further his own secret plans of world domination and control. One of his projects was a super-secret StormWatch team known only to himself that included Apollo and the Midnighter, who are essentially Superman and Batman. The new Weatherman who takes over after Bendix is a much better and more moral person, but because of that, he finds himself often having a hard time making the right decision, as he's trying to work out the difficult balancing act between doing what needs to be done, and doing what is politically and morally acceptable.
Some of the earlier issues are a bit weak in terms of writing and story, and I never really thought the art in any of the books was particularly good; especially early on, it's all the classic '90s style, with all the characters - even the non-super ones - looking incredibly thin, muscle-bound, and sinewy, and nothing particularly interesting going on visually. But story-wise at least things really start to pick up power, speed, and interest as the series goes on, and by the time we get to the end of volume one/beginning of volume two, the book is pure gold. Then things take a really stunning turn.
One of the books I mention above is a special one-shot called WildC.A.T.s/Aliens. The events in this book take place between StormWatch #10 and StormWatch #11, and despite the fact that StormWatch isn't mentioned in the title, the book is very much about the team. In fact (spoiler warning again), it represents the catastrophic end of StormWatch, and #11 is basically just a clean-up issue.
Unlike Superman and Batman Versus Aliens and Predator, this Aliens cross-over book is not just a gimmicky one-shot; it is an essential piece of the StormWatch story, and it is definitely the way to do an Aliens cross-over book. Also unlike S&BVA&P, in this book the aliens are actually really powerful and terrifying monsters (in fact, Ellis uses them to kill off almost all of his characters, and effectively destroy StormWatch), and the issue reads like an honest to God sci-fi/horror comic in terms of story structure, atmosphere, and level of violence. It's utterly fantastic and shattering, and even though Ellis kills some main characters off-screen, which felt a little unfair at first, it still works.
Apparently they found a way to bring StormWatch and a lot of the major characters back after Ellis killed it and them, which seems kind of lame to me, but hey, that's comics. Anyway, Ellis' run and what he did with the book and the characters is really fantastic. And I'm going to stop now and do the rest of The Take in another post, because this one has already gotten way too long. |
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