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POWERS #20
Highly Recommended (9/10)
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Image Comics
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Mike Avon Oeming
Colors: Peter Pantazis
Letters: Ken Bruzenak
Copy editor: K.C. McCrory
Price: $2.95 US/$4.50 CAN |
I'm a fan of a couple of David E. Kelley-created television series -- Boston Public and The Practice. One of the reasons I enjoy them so much is Kelley's willingness to shake up the status quo for the show for reasons other than casting challenges. He does so in the name of storytelling, bucking predictable endings when it comes to select core subplots. The same kind of strength is to be found in this latest issue of Powers. Bendis throws his readers for a loop this month, but it's an entertaining loop.
Christian Walker knows that the members of FG-3 were murdered, and those crimes led to the death of someone he cares about. He's determined to see justice done, but crooked politics get in the way. Walker finds himself without any options... so he makes one of his own. Meanwhile, the host of TV's Powers That Be gets an unbelievable scoop, outing a super-hero and uncovering some dirty dealings.
It never fails to surprise me... how Oeming's simple, cartoony style manages to convey the maturity and darkness of these characters and circumstances. His work is definitely at its strongest when drenched in shadow. Even with just shapes, he manages to communicate quiet but volatile moods. There's one sequence that struck me as being particular subtle but effective. As the Powers That Be broadcast scene comes to a close, the TV screen pulls away from the reader, almost fading off into the distance between it's shut off. It served a visual cue that those events were about to fade much further in the past, and it reinforced a sombre atmosphere.
And suddenly, Powers is no longer the same series it was during the previous 19 issues. The events of this issue promise to force a completely different direction for the book. I don't know what that will be, and I can't wait to find out. I love that this book is anything but predictable. There's a freedom and creativity that's fueling this title that's practically addictive.
There aren't many ongoing comic-book titles -- especially those with super-hero elements -- that see its characters grow in sudden, traumatic but plausible spurts, but Powers bucks that trend. At the end of this issue, Christian Walker is not the same man he was when the series began. From the start, we've seen him burdened by compromise and duty, trying to do the right thing when everyone around him was pressuring for something a little different. Here, he takes a stand. It some ways, it destroys him, but in others, he's reborn.
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