What happens when you give a Hugo Award winning science fiction author a comic book property and let him do pretty much whatever he wants? Well, if you’re lucky you might get a whirlwind story of imagination and character that just might teeter on the brink of something truly great.
As a note, spoilers are discussed in this review.
Written by China Mieville
Illustrated by Mateus Santolouco– Abyss has arrived! Can the newest Dialer — or anyone — stop him?
– In a desperate attempt to save Manteau from X.N., Nelson is forced to team with his enemy.
– Plus, the secrets of Squid revealed!
The titular dial of “Dial H” is such an inherently comic booky idea that one wonders how it hasn’t sustained a regular series in some form in almost a decade. Need help? Just dial up a new set of powers! It seems that the possibilities for genre or style exploration could be endless. The current iteration of the HERO Dial is being walked along a very thin tightrope of Vertigo-esque science fiction weirdness by the endlessly imaginative China Mieville. Until issue #4, the series spent a great deal of time showing Nelson Jent (our hero) dialing up every sort of costumed weirdo that Mieville could dream up, even if only for a single panel. Though the book has been a fun palette for Mieville’s creations and Santolouco’s fantastical style, it had not yet come together into a satisfying narrative; that all changes with this issue, which pays off in spades for the patient reader.
Issue #4 opens on a flashback of Squid being recruited by the villainous Ex Nihilo for his species’ ability to control the “Abyss”, a group of extraterrestrial beings from another plane of existence with the potential for great power. Mieville imbues the Abyss with a stream-of-conscious manner of speaking and the ability to shift the landscape in strange ways that Santolouco rises to with cartooning that fluidly depicts the sequence of supernatural events, even when the script is anything but straightforward. In fact, right off the bat, the script will almost certainly lose any new readers that might be jumping on.
In the present, Squid and Ex Nihilo attempt to wrangle the Abyss, while our heroes Nelson and Manteau attempt to stop them. The Squid takes a crippling blow against the Abyss, leaving X.N. to resort to kidnapping Manteau, stealing the dial, and living to fight another day. As the villains return to their “lair”, we begin to see the true depth of Mieville’s series reveal itself. X.N. is shown to be so nihilistic in her pursuit of power that the badly wounded Squid’s pleas for help go unheard. As she tortures and interrogates Manteau, the Squid is neglected and in pain, only gruffly acknowledged by X.N. when he fails to address her by her preferred name. At this point, the visual barrage of new characters and costumes has slowed down and the character begins to come out. The neglected Squid turns back to Nelson, left powerless without his dial, in an attempt to heal himself and turn his allegiances against the cold Ex Nihilo.
The character turn of the Squid feels natural because he is given an inherent sadness and was clearly only a pawn of the villainess up to this point. Santolouco drives the tragedy of his character even further by rendering recognizable pain and sadness on a very inhuman face, as well as the deep physical wounds from the battle with the Abyss. It makes for a triumphant scene when he inspires the powerless Nelson to find a hero in himself without the dial and to run head on to attempt to rescue Manteau.
Unfortunately, the writing style in the narration does tend to be a bit confusing at times and some sequences may require re-reading. While I think that Mieville has a bit of work to do in shoring up his scripting for the comic book medium, there aren’t flaws in the plot itself that are left unattended at this point. Sometimes the more uninhibitedly creative writers in comics can trip themselves up by throwing all their ideas into a script without giving everything a sturdy base to stand on. Early on it seemed like Mieville might fall prey to that very thing. Rest assured, “Dial H” #4 not only fills the characters out underneath the tights, and the masks, and the scaly skin, but gives us plenty of indication that there’s even more to discover about this world and all the weird that inhabits it.
Final Verdict: 8.5 – Buy it. Support it. Celebrate it. It’s all the right kinds of weird.
