News is measured in distance. A story will be of greater interest to a readership or TV audience the closer it is to home. It's human nature -- the more we identify with the people in the news and more commonalities we share, the more we care. War is brewing in the Middle East right now, as bombs and bullets tear through bridges and bones. But it's so far away. It's difficult for many in a Western audience to connect with those events. I think DMZ is about closing that gap, showing civil war and violence from the point of view of someone we know, of a middle-class guy who's lived a life of ignorance and comfort. Matty Roth isn't our guide to the conflict between this fictional America and the Free States, but to the real stuff that changing the lives of people who speak different languages and have differently pigmented skin.
Matty Roth is dead... or at least, that's the story the American military is feeding those living outside of the Manhattan DMZ. Roth now knows he was nothing more than a pawn to the establishment, and what's worse is that they need him dead, a symbol and excuse for an all-out assault on Manhattan. Matty has to reach his audience once again, and he needs another bargaining chip: Viktor, the asshole documentarian he was supposed to work for in the first place. Matt has plenty of new friends to help him, but there's a lot more firepower on the other side of this battle.
Burchielli's art reminds me of the angular, dynamic efforts we saw from Tan Eng Huat when he illustrated the short-lived John Arcudi-penned Doom Patrol title. I'm also put in mind a bit of the styles of Sergio (The Lone Ranger) Cariello and Scott (Beyond) Kolins. The artist conveys the intensity of the story quite well. The line art also combines well with the colors to convey a dirty, dingy look for the backdrops and characters. They serve as visual cues as to the ugliness that's inherent in this war.
This is the penultimate chapter of the longest story arc of the series thus far, so it would be logical to expect that this is meant for fans of the relatively new series. But writer Brian Wood has crafted a script that's thoroughly accessible and invites new readers in. I was honestly surprised at how much exposition and recap Wood injects into the script without being overt about it.
In terms of character, this series has very much been about watching Matt Roth grow up. The process of his adaptation to his political and physical circumstances is an ongoing one, and with each step, the character grows stronger, more likeable and more interesting. I also enjoy watching Wood expose a political regime's hypocrisy and lies, even if it is a fictional one. But most of all, I appreciate the way Wood brings the realities of a wartorn community to life. Notions of sleeping in bombed-out buildings and desperately searching for clean water are foreign concepts to most of us, and DMZ continues to impress with the ugly truths it shows with its fiction. 9/10
