Wheels Within Wheels, Moved by Hands Unseen
The plot thickens as The Operative joins forces with Revenant to close in on The General. But Sarah isn't content to let the boys keep her out of the mix, Alice was her sister after all.
The Good
Is it possible to praise the art on this series enough? I for one think not! The combination of Zircher's pencils and Troy's colors is superb and really brings this series to life.
Sarah had a very brief appearance in the last issue and this one's starts off with a flash back and some great internal dialog that gives us some information on her past. I'm a fan of strong female characters and look forward to seeing how Liss develops Sarah in the next three issues of this mini. Liss writes her just right, she's a forward thinking women, independent minded and strong willed, however, she's not a modern woman. She still feels like a woman of the 30s, but one who's believably left of center.
There's a bad habit of "cleaning up" history when writers do period fiction. They try to modernize and sanitize the characters to make them reflect our own cultural norms, but Liss makes no such concessions and I applaud him for this. The Operative is actively sexist and passively racist, things that modern readers will more than likely find offensive. This makes him a more dynamic character and makes him reflective of his era and strengthens the story. Liss gives us the 30's warts and all.
Initially Operative is totally against the idea of joining forces with Revenant, but slowly comes around. He manages to dig up some info on Revenant's identity which was rather interesting and makes a lot of sense of his M.O.
The scene with The General and The Board will be every conspiracy buff's favorite. Their engineering of the Depression and their plans for World War II displays just what kind of people our heroes are going to be up against and the extent of the power they wield.
I liked The General last issue, a lot. With this issue I officially love the guy. This guy oozes eight kinds of evil but in that reserved quietly menacing way. His confrontation with Operative and Revenant was superbly written and I was really taken aback by the revelation that occurred during it. I love the way he turns the table on our heroes.
There's a really humorous moment where Revenant breaks character because he's so shocked by what he learns about Operative's past. These two characters playoff one another very well and I love the banter between them.
Sarah makes her debut as the Aviatrix, her outfits a great homage to the Rocketeer.
The Bad
There's a theater marque featuring the main characters on the first page which ruins Piper's reveal on Revenant in the issue. It gives us his name and shows him in civilian garb. This really kills the mystery and mystique of the character and should've been avoided.
Piper walks into a cop bar to get some info on who killed Alice and does it in a manner that's more Punisher than Batman. How he walks out of that bar after the scene he caused and being a wanted man was a bit much for my suspension of disbelief.
Some may not like that the character designs in the series so far have so closely resembled those of classic pulp characters.
This is a good story, but it hasn't done anything that genre enthusiast haven't seen before. I hope in the next 3 issues Liss will do something big to differentiate this title and elevate it from good to great.
The Verdict
Buy This Comic
Another strong, and highly enjoyable issue of Mystery Men. This series is worth checking out for Zircher's superb art alone, but Liss is turning in some good work in his own right. If you've got an extra 3 bucks to move around then pick this comic up guarantee you'll want to keep doing so until the final issue.
