Adventureman #1 - Image Comics

ADVENTUREMAN No. 1, June 2020

Described by “Image Comics” as “a cataclysmic adventure decades in the making”, Matt Fraction’s script for Issue One of “Adventureman” will certainly take some considerable time to fully digest, courtesy of his whopping, fifty-six page periodical overflowing with literally dozens of colourful and complicated characters. In fact, some readers might even find the titular character’s supposed demise “at the vile hand of his ultra-nemesis Baron Bizarre on the eve of the Macabrapocalypse” something of a blessing, considering that the resultant roof-top explosion half-way through the book seemingly eradicates the need to remember the overwhelming number of super-heroes and their nefarious counter-parts.

Disappointingly though, this mid-point cataclysmic ‘cliff-hanger’ simply seems to be regarded as a reset switch in the mind of the “New York Times bestselling” writer, as he quickly fills the publication’s freshly cleaned cast’s slate with the weekly O’Connell family Shabbat dinner. Admittedly, the Eisner Award-winner’s convenient pen-pictures of the meal’s many attendees at least enables the comic’s audience to put fleeting faces to names, but once again there are simply far too many people being pushed before the eyes for anyone to arguably make a lasting impression.

In addition, the entire sequence depicting Claire’s dysfunctional siblings is rather longwinded and does nothing to actually progress the American author’s plot, except to perhaps suggest that she has a penchant for switching off her hearing aid whenever the conversation around her is tediously tiring. Happily however, this sedentarily-paced and monotonous insight into the deaf woman’s ‘domestic bliss’ is eventually brought to a much-needed end when the book-seller finally retreats back to her dead mother’s old store and encounters the strangest of new customers.

Sumptuously pencilled and coloured by the husband and wife team of Terry and Rachel Dodson, this book would debatably ‘land’ a lot better if it omitted its bloated middle belly, and instead focused upon both the marvellously manic world of Adventureman, the Gentleman and Akaal, as well as Tommy’s infectious desperation to know what happened after his favourite bedtime read comes to a disconcertingly abrupt end; “-- But everything is very much not okay in the end of that story and so that must mean that it’s not the end because it’s not okay and so I wondering --”

Script: Matt Fraction, Pencils & Colors: Terry Dodson, and Inks: Rachel Dodson