CABLE #98
"Como Esta, Usted?"
Recommended (8/10)
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Marvel Comics
Writer: David Tischman
Artist: Igor Kordey
Colors: Avalon Studios
Letters: Comicraft
Editors: Matt Hicks & Mark Powers
Price: $2.25 US/$3.50 CAN |
Are you like me... one of those comics readers who looked at Rob Liefeld's squinty-eyed, teeth-gritting Cable on the cover of New Mutants or X-Force back in the early 1990s and scratched your head, wondering what so many people saw that was so cool about Cable? And like me, did you pretty much dismiss the character's subsequent appearances for almost a decade?
The time for dismissal has come to an end. David Tischman and Igor Kordey have taken an empty vessel and crafted a story of remarkable relevance around him.
Cable finds himself the captive of the members of the Shining Path, a terrorist group with some mutant members dedicated to taking over the government of Peru. With Cable out of the way, the mutant terrorists are free to continue their attacks against government figures and agencies. The problem is that the conflict is not black and white. The Shining Path is not the only aggressor, and there are innocents caught in the crossfire.
I'm a reporter. In my business, we're told that instead of just covering the latest government program announcement, it's better to find a normal person whom that program directly impacts. It's not always feasible, but it makes for better storytelling. Tischman knows this rule applies to fiction as well. He doesn't just delve into the politics of terrorism, but he shows the reader how they affect people, and how those the terrorists represent are victims of the government as well. Though I'm not wild about yet another sexy woman throwing herself at the hero (it seems Tischman follows in the footsteps of his occasional partner, Howard Chaykin), the politically-minded quality of the book is fascinating.
Kordey's rich, textured art is a great change of pace for this title. His realistic approach makes the title character seem like something other than a mutant cyborg from the future. Instead, we come to see him as -- get this, it's a radical concept for Cable -- a man. Avalon's muted colors are in keeping with the mature tone of the story and the art as well.
Comics are, for the most part, escapist literature. We often read them in order to take us to other worlds, to leave the mundane behind and to delve into the wondrous. David Tischman has taken us into another world, all right, but no one could have predicted that he'd be dealing with subjects that are on the lips of just about every person on the planet right now. Some will be uncomfortable when faced with these thoroughly relevant realities in their super-hero fiction, but Igor Kordey sums things up with his essay on the final page. Literature should not only help us to escape, but it can help us to understand our world better. Tischman and Kordey show us something we need to see. They just couldn't have known how much we needed to see it.
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