In his "On the Ledge" column about Human Target, Milligan made several mentions of this book as a post-9-11 book that would examine America in the wake of that tragedy. Honestly, I wasn't sure what he meant, but having now seen this issue, the first part of "The Unshredded Man," I think I get it. He's not just talking about the approach of using terrorists and government paranoia, but exploring how our culture has in some ways reverted to the greed is good, fear is better corporate/government ethos that many of us lived through in the 1980's. This story incorporates the event of 9-11, corporate greed and corruption and the usual questions of identity in an interesting way, and it makes a much stronger first issue of Human Target than the actual first issue, which was so deeply tied into previous events.
Milligan's methods of storytelling on Human Target are more layered, more complex than his storytelling on X-Statix, his other big book right now. While X-Statix is a meditation on pop culture and celebrity, Human Target focuses on identity, and we're never really sure who Christopher Chance is. In the opening pages, we have a couple examples of people disguising themselves, one explaining a subterfuge that he started a year ago and the other using a disguise for a professional assassin job. There's also the deception involved on the part of the people doing the hiring of the assassin and how they're lying to their stockholders and the public, and so before Chance even makes an appearance this issue, we've got several examples of deception going on in the story.
Because Milligan has reinvented Christopher Chance as someone without much of a personality of his own, he must surround the character with interesting supporting cast and antagonists. He has succeeded in doing that with each issue, because while no one involved in the story could be called a heroic personality, they are all undoubtedly fascinating. John Matthews comes across as a desperate man, but not a horrible one, redeemed for his corporate misdeeds and his fraudulent death by his obvious love for his wife and kids, and yet he still has his rotten streak, as we see when he turns aside from simple revenge for the more complex notion of blackmail. And Ken Foley is the epitome of the corrupt corporate type, whose defining traits seem to be arrogance, cowardice and an unshakeable instinct for what will keep him alive and successful.
Javier Pulido's work here is exceptional, done in a style that is relatively simple but which has a wide range of expression and fantastic storytelling. I'm reminded of his work on Catwoman, with a similar use of small panels and seemingly insignificant details that gives a larger, more comprehensive picture of the setting and the characters. Lee Loughridge's colors also seem just perfectly suited to the work at hand, with a sort of monochromatic look in the backgrounds that sets tone as much as defining specific images. I'm not quite as sold on Pulido as an action storyteller, as his work is just a little more abstract than I like for the gun fight toward the tail end of the book, but overall the art looks great.
Honestly, I'm a little puzzled as to how Milligan managed to hook me so effectively, because he doesn't really provide much in the way of likable characters in this story. We can root for Matthews, but it's obvious that he's meant to be a little short-sighted and greedy. We can root for Chance, but he's deeply screwed up and perhaps a bit amoral. Somehow, however, perhaps because the situations are so intriguing or perhaps because the characters are so rich and real, I'm very curious to see what happens and where the story goes from here, and the notion of Chance getting involved in unusual lives in this way seems like a pretty good premise for an ongoing series.
