THE AGENCY #2
"Episode 2: Houston, We Have a Problem..."
Recommended (8/10)
|
Image Comics/Top Cow Productions
Writer: Paul Jenkins
Artist: Kyle Hotz
Colors: Matt Nelson
Letters: Dreamer Design
Editor: Renae Geerlings
Price: $2.50 US |
The greatest strength of Jenkins's story of corporate law enforcement is its cynicism. He's not just telling the story of a hunt for a serial killer in the future; he's tearing apart capitalism and our reliance on it. When I read the first issue last month, The Agency struck me as being like Warren Ellis's Transmetropolitan if it were about policing as opposed to journalism, and that still holds true.
The string of murders in Houston match the pattern of a serial killer known as God's Man, so the Agency team of Virtual Jonez, Kerrick, Sioux, David Siam and their boss Quarter decide to visit the original killer in his specially designed prison. They get more -- and less -- than they bargained for there, and it leads them to the mansion of a billionnaire with a special link to God's Man.
Hotz's inky style is perfectly suited to rendering a story and characters with the tones as dark as these. His vision of the technology of the future is organic and creepy, and it reminded me more than a little of the detailed and disturbing designs in Phil Hester and Mike Huddleston's The Coffin, from Oni Press.
We never really see God's Man in this story, flashback or not, yet Jenkins convinced me of the terror he represents quite well. The way the others characters speak about the killer, the way they react to hearing his name... it paints a picture of terror and blood that seems disturbingly genuine.
Jenkins isn't out to catch a killer in this book, though, but to rail against Corporate America. His message is clear... the bottom line is that the Corporate Bottom Line will always get in the way of once-public services that now reside in the private sector. The Agency isn't out to make the world a better and safer place. It's out a make a buck, and murder victims simply dent the receivables.
Email Don MacPherson comments about this review, or discuss it on the Fourth Rail message board.
|
