This chronic feature lets me review what’s recently passed my bloodshot pupils.
So pull up a chair, break out the sarcasm filter and welcome to:
Mr. Zad’s comic critique
Superman: Red Son, trade paperback (DC Comics, $17.95): What if the comic book icon who stood for truth, justice and the American way had grown up in the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics?
Mark Millar explored this premise in last year’s brilliant three-part series, now released as a trade paperback — which highlights why he’s clearly one of the best writers in the sequential art business.
The story offers enough intrigue as it stands, but Mr. Millar’s intricate layering of the Superman mythos within the Cold War climate — while throwing in enough social implications to make George Orwell rise from his grave — will force readers to gladly digest the book numerous times.
As the Man of Steel grows up under the tutelage of the real-life man of steel, Josef Stalin, readers learn that despite the costumed comrade’s indoctrination into the ways of communism, the hero still values human life and safety above all else, and equally spends his time saving both capitalists and communists rather than preaching political ideologies.
This leads to a conundrum, with a very paranoid American government having no idea how to deal with a nonhostile superbeing working for the enemy.
President Eisenhower calls upon brilliant, egomaniacal scientist Lex Luthor, who’s married to Lois Lane, to come up with aggressive deterrents to an unstoppable force that makes NATO’s nuclear arsenal seem laughable.
The book’s major confrontations are then set into motion as Luthor, who can’t stand losing, must push the violence envelope in destroying a superior being who really just wants to help mankind.
As the story develops, readers are introduced to a Bizarro with a conscience and to Lana Lang as a Soviet who grew up with Superman in the collective, and Wonder Woman who will sacrifice all to help the controlling hero.
Batman also plays a pivotal role in the drama, leading an organized resistance against the Soviet oppressors after his parents are murdered during one of Stalin’s infamous purges.
With the passing of Stalin, Superman eventually must lead the Soviet Union and finds himself stuck in a deadly game of control with disobedient subjects. He learns the hard way that the pen is mightier than the fist as Luthor grows more powerful in America.
I won’t reveal the ending after the red hero takes on the role of misunderstood dictator, but Lex Luthor ultimately creates a Utopian society that no longer requires any super man.
Another observation: Despite the tag team artwork between Dave Johnson and Killian Plunkett, the style throughout the piece stays consistent and worthy of admiration.
Mr. Millar had been ruminating on the Red Son idea since 1995, and the wealth and depth of characters — along with its well-thought-out story — will make both the comic book fan and historical fiction aficionado bask in his imaginative prose.
To the point
A selected peek at titles that didn’t inspire a bloated evaluation:
• Tales of Ordinary Madness, trade paperback (Oni Press, $11.95): The hopelessness associated with mental illness comes to light in a depressing tale of a psychiatrist who begins to identify with his patients. Writer Malcolm Bourne, a psychiatrist in real life, originally wrote this piece in 1992 for Dark Horse Comics as a four-part miniseries with the legendary Mike Allred providing black-and-white illustration. It has been revived as a trade paperback and easily manages to maintain its powerful statements of despair. Obsessions, compulsions and addictions are revealed as an unnamed doctor tries to treat an unstoppable parade of suffering individuals. The mature-themed work pulls no punches and hauntingly reveals the most fragile of humans damaged by heredity or circumstances beyond their control.
• Scooby-Doo: The Essential Guide, reference work (DK Publishing Inc., $12.99): The meddling mutt and his best pals are highlighted in this 47-page, hard-bound, colorful, image-packed encyclopedia. The guide includes: bios on the Mystery Inc. gang, schematics of the Mystery Machine and legendary “Shaggy sandwich,” a genealogy of the Doo family, roundups on famous ghouls, ghosts and monsters, case notes on the first season of animated episodes, maps of two of the gang’s favorite haunts and even a plot breakdown of the latest live-action movie, “Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed.”
• Punisher, Nos. 1 and 2 (Marvel Comics, $2.99 each): A new series under Marvel’s MAX banner (due to mature and explicit content) allows writer Garth Ennis to unleash the exploits of the comic book world’s most feared and controversial vigilante. It arrives just as Lions Gate Films’ cinematic ode to the big lug hits movie theaters this weekend. Frank Castle enjoys dishing up revenge (served especially rare) in these first two issues, as he almost single-handedly wipes out a crime family during the birthday and then the funeral of its leader. Meanwhile, an old friend of Castle’s looks to forcibly take control of him. Penciling duties by Lewis Larosa illustrate, in a most gory fashion, the carnage produced when a destructive and violent character finds a den of evil to feast upon.
• Zadzooks! wants to know you exist. Call 202/636-3016, fax 202/269-1853, e-mail jszadkowski@washingtontimes.com or write to Joseph Szadkowski, The Washington Times, 3600 New York Ave. NE, Washington, DC 20002.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.