The Fix #1 Cover Cropped Reviews 

“The Fix” #1

By | April 7th, 2016
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What if “Superior Foes Of Spider-Man” got rid of the costumed gimmicks, were allowed to swear and had somehow managed to simultaneously marathon The Sopranos and The Wire? Well, then, you’d have “The Fix”, the new crime series by Nick Spencer and Steve Lieber.

But does “The Fix” match up to the legacy of its predecessor? Let’s find out below in our spoiler free review.

Written by Nick Spencer
Illustrated by Steve Lieber
From the creators of The Superior Foes of Spider-Man, comes a story of the crooked cops, scheming mobsters, and corrupt politicians that run things—and the sex toy that can bring them all down. Oh, and the hero is a drug-sniffing beagle named Pretzels. Bad people do bad things to each other in this frenetic, outrageous, sometimes off-putting new caper! If you liked classic crime comics like CRIMINAL and 100 Bullets we apologize in advance for letting you down!

“The Fix” #1 is about being mad at the world. It’s about looking out into the world and finding no place for yourself and thinking “Screw it, I’m going to make one.” Yet it’s probably not in the way you think. “The Fix” is about being mad at the world because you realise it’s all a joke, that everyone ends following the same path through life laid out for them by the system because it’s easy. Go to college, get a job, find a wife, have some kids, be miserable until you die alone and penniless. It’s a middle finger in the air to society from two guys who want nothing more than to be the worst people they possible can and get rich doing so.

The core of “The Fix” #1 that makes it work are the characters. It’s a dark comedy of a crime comic and at the heart of it, seeing these two guys flip flop from being so enraptured by just how terrible they can be and how easy it is to get away with it to being way over the heads in debt to a mob boss makes for some pretty great comedic moments. The mob boss himself is a highlight of how Spencer and Lieber use juxtaposition to subvert reader expectations to create comedy. I don’t want to spoil it, obviously, but let’s just he’s the highlight of a cast of characters who all create a juxtaposition between who they appear to be and who they actually are underneath.

That’s a running theme throughout the issue and it’s probably the most interesting part of the Spencer’s writing to me. This comic feels like Spencer and Lieber airing out all of their frustrations with the world on their sleeves and with the extended page count of the comics – clocking in at close to 40 pages of story – let’s them cover a lot of ground in this first issue alone. From the irony of worshipping cops who are just as bad as the criminals they kill to the corruption of film producers to the internet takeover of crime, this could have very well read as “Old Man Yells At Cloud” of comics if it weren’t so damn funny most of the time.

Yeah, that’s right, I said most of the time. That’s the thing about comedy, not every joke is going to land and the thing about this issue being almost 40 pages long is that it’s more jokes than it is plot. Spencer and Lieber frequently take page long diatribes to go into the aforementioned “Old Man Yells At Cloud” topics like a character’s unfortunate experience with his own ejaculate that get close to burying the actual story happening. It’s a method that builds character, sure, and invests the reader into the world, but coming out of this issue it was hard to get a grasp of what the story was outside of strung together vignettes. Now, I don’t want to be the one complaining that she’s getting a nearly 40 page comic issue for $3.99, but as a first impression of the series, the writing felt a little haphazard in terms of the actual story.

Thankfully, that was largely made up for by Steve Lieber’s art. Lieber has a style that has the perfect mix of reality and cartoonishness to sell the grittiness of the crime drama at the heart of the book while keeping the almost lighthearted tone of much of the comedy with ludicrous panels visualising the characters’ narration that makes for a perfect punctuation of visual comedy. In fact, it’s probably more visual comedy than it is gritty, to be perfectly honestly. Sure, it’s largely set in the underbelly of Los Angeles, but this isn’t a particularly dark crime comic, which stands it apart from most of Image’s crime offering. Lieber focuses on the almost absurd visual comedy aspects which elevates the writing by bringing a tongue-in-cheek feeling to the comedy. It certainly made the opening segment a lot more enjoyable than if it had been played straight.

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Even in the colours, the art eschews the grim dark noir feeling that most crime comics seem to ascribe to these days with Ryan Kill bringing a pretty naturalistic palette that emphasises oranges and blue-greys. It keeps the artwork grounded lest if sway too close to the absurdity of the visual comedy and lets the more dramatic scenes play out with harsh black inks juxtaposed with deep warm colours to keep the mood focused on the drama. It’s the kind of colouring that feels perfectly natural; you don’t really notice that it’s there because it’s doing its job so well.

All in all, “The Fix” #1 is a damn fine comic. It’s not the best comic you’ll ever read, but it’s funny and if you’ve been hankering for more crime hijinks in the style of “Superior Foes Of Spider-Man” then it’s definitely going to be for you. The increased page count for $3.99 does make it seem more worth it, but the longer issue makes for a more unwieldy structure and the story often gets buried under comedic diatribes. Hopefully a more reigned in scope with subsequent issues can alleviate that as Nick Spencer and Steve Lieber definitely make a good first impression with despicable characters with that are somehow still funny and perfectly crafted visual comedy.

Final Verdict: 7.0 – Hard recommendation for fans of “Superior Foes”, but it won’t be for you if you weren’t a fan.


Alice W. Castle

Sworn to protect a world that hates and fears her, Alice W. Castle is a trans femme writing about comics. All things considered, it’s going surprisingly well. Ask her about the unproduced Superman films of 1990 - 2006. She can be found on various corners of the internet, but most frequently on Twitter: @alicewcastle

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