Top of the Pile 8/29/2012

Spaceman #9
Written by: Brian Azzarello
Art by: Eduardo Risso
Cover by: Dave Johnson
Publish by: Vertigo

I know, this is a couple days after the Wednesday release of this book. But I have a thing with limited series. I wait until the complete before I read them. I have found that, let’s just say, the release schedules for limited series are somewhat looser than ongoing titles. So instead of just reading the single issue this week, I had the enjoyment of reading the whole series to get to the top of the pile with Spaceman #9.

This series is a scifi adventure with Orson as the main character. Orson is what people call a spaceman. He was genetically engineered by NASA to survive better on Mars. So he is bigger and has a simian look to him. Spacemen in this flooded Earth are ostracised and shunned. But he’s a nice guy just trying to live his life. Everyone on Earth also watch web videos, and the most popular one is called “The Ark”, which is some sort of reality show with orphans. When Orson stumbles onto the botched kidnapping attempt of the star of The Ark, a young girl named Tara, he ends up in the middle of tons of trouble. At the same time, there is a simultaneous plotline of Orson and three of his fellow spacemen on an outpost on Mars, which turns into a Treasure of Sierra Madre type story.

Brian Azzarello tells a good story. One of the first things you’ll notice when you start reading is that he has created a slang lingo. Often dropping syllables from words or spelling phonetically, it takes a little effort to get the complete understanding. But like pig latin, the more you read the easier it is to comprehend. The dialog helps realize the future world Azzarello creates, which is believable. An underwater world where the rich live in a walled, dry area while the rest live on the water scraping a life for themselves. We feel for Orson. He’s not dumb nor naive, but he seems the optimist. However, the other characters are mostly plot devices without much depth to them. Which is understandable in a limited series.

And Eduardo Risso helps create this future world with his detailed art. The backgrounds are fully realized and each frame conveys tons of information. We see how bleak the world becomes. And by issue 9, we see how opulent the rich society becomes. Character designs are interesting in a futuristic way.

So, I didn’t discuss Spaceman #9 specifically too much. But as the climax to an interesting story, it was a very good issue. I would certainly add the trade of this series to any public library library, though it might be a little mature for a teen area. And for non-comic readers who like scifi, this would be a good suggestion for them to pickup.