When I set-out to re-read “The Question,” I’d forgotten just how many issues have Junior in it. It’s not often, last time was issue #6, but O’Neil really seemed to love this antagonist as a foil to Vic. He also gets sadder and sadder with each appearance. Maybe this will be his final appearance. With an election arc next, I wouldn’t be surprised.
Spoilers ahead
Cover by Denys Cowan
and Bill SienkiewiczWritten by Denny O’Neil
Pencilled by Denys Cowan
Inked by Dick Giordano & Malcolm Jones III
Colored by Tatjana Wood
Lettered by Willie Schubert“REJECTS.” Vic Sage faces his biggest test yet…his high school reunion.
Before I get to any of the contents of the story, I wanted to take a small bit to give a fond farewell to Rick Magyar. After 20 straight issues and one annual of inking, and one issue where he penciled as well, Magyar leaves the team for greener pastures. His inks solidified the feel of “The Question” in all it’s gritty, hard-boiled but still open glory and his presence will be missed. Dick Giordano does a fine job of inking Cowan’s pencils but it doesn’t have quite the same impact. There’s an over-reliance on crosshatching rather than a melding of solid blacks and scratchy shadows. It leaves too much bright and renders the art flatter than it should be.
Then comes Malcolm Jones III. This was not Jones III’s first inking job for DC but it is his second most famous title, coming right after a small cult book known as “The Sandman.” Magyar and Jones III both got how to bring Cowan’s pencils to life and to make Hub City and it’s citizens feel unique. The character of the city is exuded through Jones III’s dense inks and careful cross-hatching.
I particularly love the way he renders Mayor Wesley Fermin in these issues. He’s ominous but not in a foreboding way, more like he feels more real than he has before, more solid, and that’s a worrying prospect. Cowan keeps us close on his face often, driving home how unhinged he is, and how lost to the bottle he’s become. Without Jones III’s inks, that feeling would be lessened.
Malcolm Jones III committed suicide in 1996. He is missed and it is a travesty that his Wikipedia page is as bare-bones as it is. He was, from what I’ve gathered, an intensely private person but the log of his work deserves better.
Jones III’s first arc on “The Question” centers around the culmination of Myra’s bid for mayor of Hub City. It’s an intense arc, following the semi-breather issues featuring Junior, taking place with the looming threat of a tornado and horrible storm, all while a more human storm is brewing thanks to Dinsmore’s attempts to fix the election. It’s not that he’s afraid he’ll lose; Myra has a lot against her in the public’s eye, much of it boiling down to the double standards women are held to in positions of power and general sexism, and he’s done a great job running a race-baiting, fear mongering campaign that would make Tucker Carlson proud. No, he wants to make certain he’ll win. He’s not leaving anything to chance.
So the ballot boxes are tampered with, he hires a good-squad to intimidate poll goers and his campaign manager buys votes with bottles of wine. O’Neil is really driving home how garbage this candidate is as well as how certain he is that, even if any of his plans fail, it won’t matter to the public and he’ll escape justice. Because this is a story, Dinsmore does not survive the storm, although he almost bit it thanks to Vic feeding his station a false story. It’s an interesting conundrum Vic is placed in because the cost of inaction or the wrong action could be catastrophic yet what he has to do compromises himself.
There is no perfect answer. Dinsmore could not be allowed to win but the system bred him, supports him, and shields him. He would never face traditional justice and the harm he did would forever remain. If Vic resorts to the same tactics as Dinsmore, and succeeds, does that taint the work and de-legitimize the victory? And if they let the system burn, as it perhaps should, what guarantee is there that what comes next is any better?
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And throughout it all, Myra is fighting her uphill battle. She doesn’t want the job but she feels she must do it. She’s seen the city’s corruption as a reporter and as an insider in the mayoral mansion. Dinsmore’s roots lie quite literally in the town’s first stolen election, in the rot built into the system. Myra doesn’t believe that the rot is part of the system, rather a corruption of it. She believes Hub City can be better with a leader that is reflective not of its historical grift and graft but of its tenacity and future growth.
She’s wrong, and that is the lesson of ‘Election Day,’ that victories against the entrenched and deeply rooted are short lived. A controlled burn is rare, perhaps impossible. For Dinsmore may be dead, taken out by the only thing that could, an act of God. . .
But Wesley Fermin still had a gun.
Next week, before we start “The Question’s” third and final year, we’ll take a short break from the main series to read “The Question” Annual #2.
