With all of the hullabaloo over the DCnU relaunch this week, I’ve noticed some people forget two crucial things: one, that other companies other than DC still put out comics and two, that they aren’t the only company that can insert familiar characters into a wildly new status quo.
Last year, in the wake of Marvel mini-event Shadowland, New York’s Hell’s Kitchen district found itself without a protector as Daredevil vacated the premises to find his soul again for the first time (or something, I dunno, that event ended poorly). Enter T’Challa, the FORMER Black Panther (despite the name on the cover), fresh off his stint as a failed monarch, to take his place.
When I first heard that this would be going on, I initially had zero interest in reading the book and passed over the first arc entirely. However, a newly discovered love of artist Francesco Francavilla caused me to backtrack a bit to the first collection of this era, and what I found was an incredibly competent, genuinely compelling and beautifully illustrated series that not only functions as a fantastic street level noir tale, but a functional super hero yarn as well.
I should note that as of yet, I have not read beyond the first “Urban Jungle” arc of this book, so for all I know this book could have tumbled down hill faster than a greased up turkey on a treadmill. However, if I actually felt that was a possibility I wouldn’t be writing this recommendation (and probably would have come up with a better analogy just now). The reason for my confidence is due primarily to the immensely strong start writer David Liss and artist’s Francavilla and Jefte Palo gave the book right off the bat.
Simply put, one could not wish for a stronger foundation.
While the uber-rich King T’Challa operating as a street level hero, filling Daredevil’s shoes may seem like a spectacularly unrealistic concept on the surface; Liss makes it work within the current context of T’Challa’s existence. Following Doomwar and the destruction of his nation’s livelihood, T’Challa leaves his younger sister Shuri to steer the sinking ship and operate as the public Black Panther (complete with Panther powers(!)) and finds his way to New York in (I assume) the immediate aftermath of Shadowland. At the request of Matt Murdock himself, he agrees to protect Hell’s Kitchen in Matt’s absence while he struggles to determine who he really is in the wake of his utter failure as the ruler of Wakanda.
With the help of Foggy Nelson, he establishes the new identity of Mr. Okonkwo and becomes the manager of a local diner not only as a cover, but as a legitimate source of income. I feel this is a subtle detail that really helps the overall construction of the story. The fact that he actually NEEDS the diner in order to AFFORD to be Black Panther is really indicative of just how far the character has fallen, and therefore his utilizing the bare bones technological resources Hell’s Kitchen has to offer him to achieve his goals works so much better than if he had just “decided to slum it”. It reminds me of the time Hawkeye went and bought arrows at Walmart due to lack of resources (it happened!) in that it accomplishes a really subtle insertion of that rare human element that so many writers try and insert into their super heroes and so often fail at.
In this first arc, through his immersive interaction with the people of Hell’s Kitchen, T’Challa discovers a plot by new villain Vlad the Impaler, a Romanian immigrant given powers by the Romanian government back when it was VERY corrupt. Given that 50% of my parents and 100% of my grandparents are Romanian and the language was (and still is) regularly spoken in my home, I was particularly attuned to the usage of the nationality. While the broken English did get grating at times, the use of the Romanian language and the augmentation of it’s cultural history was spot on. (According to my father, creating someone like Vlad is TOTALLY something CeauÈ™escu would have done. Yes, I checked.) However, much like the depth added to T’Challa through his civilian identity, Vlad’s existence as a father (and a legitimately caring one at that) as well as his interactions with his family really served to add a particularly unique element to his character. Sure, villains have had families before, but Vlad is the first one in a long time that actually seemed to CARE about his family beyond the surface level. He cared just as much about his family as he did his criminal empire and it showed in Liss’ handling of him.
Continued belowMoving on to the element of the story that I most adore: the art. Francesco Francavilla is hands down one of the most underrated artists working in the industry today (unless your name happens to be Scott Snyder or Walter Richardson). However, his art brings a level of depth and dimension to the stories he draws that really has not been seen in quite some time. Clearly taking his cues from the Godfathers (Joe Kubert, John Romita Sr.) and a few modern greats (Sean Phillips mostly), Francavilla paints a lush, detailed picture of the grim, downtrodden Hell’s Kitchen. Bathed in shadow, Francavilla’s characters struggle valiantly to burst free of the (literal and theoretical) darkness that surrounds them, succeeding sometimes and failing others. On the other side, while his style is distinctly more angular, Jefte Palo continues these trends in his one fill-in issue of the arc, and while his art lacks the sheer detail and smoothness that exists in Francavilla’s work, it uses its strengths to maintain visual continuity between issues.
I’ve now managed to go into intense detail on the characters, situations and art present in this story, yet haven’t really managed to touch on the plot itself. I didn’t even mentioned the psychotic social worker or the braindead monster. For those juicy bits you’ll just have to pick up the book itself. In the meantime, I will sit and patientily wait for Trade #2.
(Or, more realistically, I will probably buckle and catch myself up with single issues. If you see me review a single issue of this title at any point in the future, you’ll know I caved.)
