Written by Tony Bedard
Illustrated by Ardian SyafFLASH FACT! He will drown the world — then rule it!
So, why exactly is Aquaman such a jerk in the Flashpoint world? Actually, why is almost everyone in the setting such a jerk? The latter would take more than a three-issue miniseries to answer, but Tony Bedard and Ardian Syaf aim to address the former in this – you guessed it – three-issue miniseries. Follow the cut to see what I thought of the first issue.
I’m familiar with Tony Bedard. I usually like Tony Bedard. He’s not exactly the biggest gun that DC has, but he is a solid and versatile writer that is a good tool for DC to have under their belt with the upcoming relaunch. That being said, I did not care for this issue. The story wasn’t bad, per se, but the plotting and pacing were incredibly disengaging. I understand that for a story like this, you’re going to have to go through a lot of exposition, but there’s a way to deal with exposition with style and grace. In fact, it seemed to me like that was exactly what Bedard was trying to do. The various flashback scenes were there to break up the monotony while still keeping the reader informed – at least, that’s what I assumed they were there for. Instead, though, they’re handled a bit carelessly, and while they keep the comic from becoming a flat read, they also make it a bit of a chore to get through.
Additionally, the characters in this comic seemed incredibly flat. This I was not expecting, as one of my favorite things about Bedard’s R.E.B.E.L.S. was the way that he was able to give each character a level of depth and color that other writers might miss. Instead, in this issue all I got was: Aquaman is angry; Ocean Master is crafty; Brion is haughty. Even then, the little bit of character in each of these figures was so obscured through stale dialogue that they seemed even more one-dimensional than my incredibly brief descriptions make them sound.
I think what hurts the issue most, though, is how insignificant it feels. I’m not saying that in the sense of “oh, this isn’t important to the ongoing continuity of DC, so I’m not interested” like some people do. That’s the mentality that really hurts the industry. Rather, I as a reader had no personal stake in the story at hand – perhaps due to the aforementioned lack of character. There was nothing present for me to latch onto and go “Alright, I’m ready for more of that.” There’s no compelling reason for me to pick up the next issue, because it doesn’t really seem like this series is telling any particular story. Instead, it seems like the sort of thing you would find in a Flashpoint: Secret Files and Origins special; that is, something that fleshes out the new setting a bit more, but doesn’t really stand on its own as an interesting story. Maybe the next issue will change things, but this issue really didn’t compel me to find out.
Ardian Syaf’s artwork is pretty good. Nothing astounding, but nothing terrible, either. His figure work is rather solid, and he’s very good at avoiding dull background syndrome – though I’m sure some of the latter can be attributed to collaborators Vicente Cifuentes and Kyle Ritter. His style, though, is pretty standard. He’s got that Jim Lee-esque refined 90s look, with a rather heavy use of crosshatching and the like. Again, it’s not bad, but it’s nothing I haven’t seen before. There is, however, one page that he deserves a good amount of applause for. That last two-page spread is an incredibly inventive use of space and time in sequential art, and that’s what’s important in comics. While a neat style is always nice, what’s more important is how you use the medium to your advantage, and that spread shows that Syaf has a great idea of how sequential art works.
Final Verdict: 4.7 – Browse if you’re interested.
