Now this is interesting. Leaving aside the story for a moment, Helios #1 is a full-color production from a brand new company that appears to have come out of nowhere. I tend to want to support that kind of gumption in an industry that tends to drown in the wake of the big two to some extent, and while Helios didn't blow me away right up front, I do like the genre blend of superheroes, military fiction and politics that the creators have come up with. The artwork reminds me very much of the stuff that we've seen on a lot of early Devil's Due work, solid but clearly the work of people still finding their feet, and the whole book has a sort of average, decent but not exceptional quality to it. That said, there are some intriguing notions here that, if explored further, could lead Helios to a more unique and captivating place.
For me, there are two defining moments in Helios #1. One is when Blur, one of the female superheroines, finds a couple soldiers hiding out from visiting politicos in the ladies room. The other is when Blur and the other two members of her team take on Hate, a super-powered villain, and things get exceptionally brutal. These two moments make it pretty plain that Helios is not going to be just another superhero book, that Rand and company have plans to include a little touch of real world in their look at superpowers. Of course, this kind of thing isn't unheard of in this day and age, and Helios has stiff competition from the attempts to "real up" the DC, Marvel and Wildstorm universes, but Helios has the advantage of not having any spandex history to contend with.
A shame, then, that the spandex feeling creeps in anyway. I love unapologetic superhero books with capes, superheroes, and all that jazz, but I prefer that if a book is going to aim for a more real tone, that it doesn't go in for the cliches at the same time. The codenames that Rand has developed here are kind of lame, and not in the "the military came up with them" unimaginative lame that would fit the story, and the presentation of the fight is very much in the Silver Age style, steering clear of showing the real consequences of physical violence on that scale. Mike Penny, President of Dakuwaka, namechecks The Authority in his afterword to the book, but the creative team doesn't really deliver on that style here, for the most part. There are exceptions, though, notably the brutal beating that Blur takes at the hands of Hate, which is probably the most affecting sequence in the whole book, making the reader see the real consequences this under-funded team faces when taking on dangerous villains.
The fight with Blur and Hate evokes a certain amount of emotion and mood, but the rest of the art doesn't really do that. Pena and Dreier are clearly talented, and they have clear layouts which make for solid storytelling, but their work doesn't really engage the reader on an emotional level for the most part. The inconsistent shapes of characters' faces and somewhat generic expressions speak of developing talent, and while the fundamentals are certainly there, there's a lack of flair and style in the art so far. To give credit where it's due, however, Pena and Dreier avoid the rookie mistake of lackluster backgrounds, providing some really nice backdrops for the action, especially in the full-page splash of Hate tearing up the outside world. They might not sell the destruction and loss of life the way Bryan Hitch or Frank Quitely can, but they certainly don't take shortcuts in regard to the backgrounds, which gives me a lot of hope for future issues.
All told, Helios #1 reminds me more than anything of the first two titles in Devil's Due's new Aftermath superhero line. It's solidly constructed, with a few stylistic tweaks in concept, but not really exceptional enough in any way to stand out from the numerous exceptional superhero titles on the market. It is a solid first issue, with decent craft on the parts of all creators involved, but the few things that make it different from the other hundreds of superhero titles on the rack aren't emphasized enough yet, and these new creators are competing with some very established, very polished pros and characters in that arena. 6/10
