A Few More Pages Needed
Review
Well, that was a bit of a sudden stop.
Nowhere Men started out really good. It gave a simple set up, did some nice work to introduce you to all the main characters, and then took a strange turn towards something else.
This book wanted to be presenting science as the new rock and roll, and it did that excellently at first. We got a profile of all the "Beatles" type of characters introduced in a way that I thought was done rather nicely in a newspaper article. Complete bios and everything.
The book then took a turn at jumping into the future of those characters were they have succeeded and become old. One is missing, and we are shown what I am assuming is one of their creations going crazy and killing scientists. I was right along for the ride, looking to see what happened in all those years in-between.
Can I say that I'm a fan of the double page spread for the title page? I think it is a nice take on it and I can't recall it being done in many comics before. A lot of the Jonathan Hickman books do it, and it is done nicely. We get some pictures that will typically have some meaning behind the title of the story of the story itself, and it always looks like something that should be on a poster. I like that about a title page in a comic book.
Then the story does a big shift and goes to a new setting and new characters. Interesting turn of events. I rolled with it hoping to see some sort of connection to the first story, but I had a hard time trying to connect it. Essentially, you get the idea that the project that the second cast of characters is working on is probably financed by the first group of characters. But they don't get the same sort of intro and treatment that the first group did. Granted, there was still enough ground work to establish some personality and who was who, but it just felt like it got cut off at the end.
This issue really felt like it should have been a double sized first issue. The story had the right pace going for it, it just needed a few more pages to get everything really rolling. This is sad because it feels just like another Image first issue that just didn't have the right legs to stand on coming out the door. The idea is pretty cool, but the execution just didn't feel like it was there.
And after looking at all the story, I must say that the art was nicely done. Effective, and gave each character some body language to work with. The backgrounds seem to be about half not there and half sorta there. What I mean by that is that it seemed there was a lot of room left for dialogue that could have easily been filled with something else besides the blank space. Perhaps more close up shots of the characters would have prevented that problem.
Grades
Words: 7/10
Pictures: 7/10
Buy Next Issue: I'm split about it. I may check out the second issue if my shop gets it, but I may just wait until later and get the digital version.
