You Should Own This: Comeback

Summary

This is the story of two agents of Reconnect, a company that specializes in reuniting people with their deceased loved ones assuming the price is right. How do they do this? By using time travel. Give Reconnect the information they need and they’ll be able to jump back up to sixty-six days into the past, grab your loved one, and fake their death so you can be reunited in the present and run off together into the sunset. The only trouble with all this is that it’s highly illegal.

And did I mention confusing? Because things get confusing when the FBI gets on the trail of two Reconnect agents, Mark and Seth, that find themselves wrapped up in a dark conspiracy involving their employers. Who is it that’s sold out Reconnect? Could it have been Mark or Seth? Anything’s possible when time travel gets involved.

Why It’s Awesome

Man, is this book a sight for sore eyes. Michael Walsh is an artist with a style halfway somewhere between Aja and Mazzucchelli. Yes, that is just as good if not better than it sounds. His characters are classic noir with tired eyes and slumped shoulders that turn into prone fear when the action starts. The anatomy is solid but not slavish to realism. The man’s just at home drawing someone smoking a cigarette as he is depicting someone’s body exploding into a series of bloody tumors.

A lot of the credit though for what makes this book pop goes to Jordie Bellaire. She’s just astounding with such brave choices on how to color each scene with one standout being a tense scene that would be at home in any thriller being done in pink. It’s really reminiscent of Drive in a lot of ways.

A big reason to love this book has to go to just how different it feels. It doesn’t feel like traditional American comics even with it’s firm footing in noir. It’s got that European feel to it where things are allowed to be different and head in less conventional directions. Even the lettering, done by writer Ed Brisson, feels different with just how casual it can be. This comic’s not trying too hard to be something, it just is and it’s trusting you as a reader to keep up with it.

This really is a book for fans of time travel fiction. This isn’t Back to the Future. Not everyone knows how things work and they follow strict rules because of it. The introduction of time travel complicates things for everyone and it comes with all these weird, nasty side effects that don’t seem too far-fetched for messing with the space-time continuum. And if there’s another you running around, then what the fuck are you doing? Brisson’s clearly having fun with all the ideas he’s juggling and it’s definitely something he’s put a lot of work into.

Buy This If

Did you like Looper? Or even just anything at all about the movie? Do you think Primer would have been better with a dash of Reservoir Dogs? Then you’re looking for a Comeback.

McStack