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TRANSMETROPOLITAN #51 (Best of the Week!)
"Two-Fisted Editor"
Highly Recommended (10/10)
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DC Comics/Vertigo imprint
Writer: Warren Ellis
Pencils: Darick Robertson
Inks: Rodney Ramos
Colors: Nathan Eyring
Letters: Clem Robins
Editor: Heidi MacDonald
Price: $2.50 US/$4.25 CAN |
Mitchell Royce, Spider Jerusalem's long-suffering editor, is the focus of this issue, and we learn that he is actually much smarter and tougher than we may have given him credit for previously. This issue made Royce one of my favorite characters of the series, and Robertson and Ellis portray him as full of the same glee and intelligence that Spider has shown in his crusade against the President, but with less insanity. The result is one of my favorite issues of Transmetropolitan since the storm took the City a few
issues back.
Royce has mostly served as
another target for Spider's rants in the past, a representation of the good guy
hamstrung by bureaucracy who wanted to be an ally but just couldn't. This issue
we see that Royce is instead what Spider could have been, and that he may have
been a great deal like Spider in the past. He's got cleverness to spare, and can
be as ruthless and devious as need be to get the job done. He has also kept
hidden from us a sense of humor not unlike Spider's, one that revels in catching
the bad people and making them pay.
Things have been looking
quite catastrophic for Spider in past issues, with all of his evidence gone and
a debilitating disease closing in on him. This issue provides a spark of hope
without feeling contrived, and as a benefit gives me that feeling I got whenever
something surprising and pleasant happened in the story. There's a joy to be had
from seeing that the bad guys don't always win, and that Spider and Royce are
considerably smarter than even the reader gave them credit for.
There's also joy to be found
in the humor of this issue. Royce's glee in doing his job is terrific, and his
rants to Spider or to the cab driver are simply things of beauty. Robertson does
the usual fantastic job of atmosphere as well, with dark borders and a sense of
hopelessness early on but energy and excitement when the truth becomes known.
His artwork on this title has been nothing short of spectacular, whether it's
the odd visual of Spider in a wetsuit throwing frogs at the TV or the cackling
visage of Mitchell Royce, Two-Fisted Editor.
Transmetropolitan is closing in on its final issue,
with less than a year to go, and it's issues like this that make me realize just
how much I'm going to miss it when it's gone.
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