Pacific Rim Tales from Year Zero

Title: Pacific Rim: Tales from Year Zero

Series: Original Graphic Novel
Publisher: Legendary Comics

Publication Date: 2013
Creative Team:
            Writer: Travis Beacham

Artists:

Sean Chen

Yvel Guichet

Pericles Junior

Chris Batista

Geoff Shaw

Genre: Sci-Fi, Action, Monsters, Robots

Pacific Rim: Tales from Year Zero had three strikes against it before I ever held a copy.  Strike One: I’ve got geek street cred for days but I really don’t have much love for kaiju.  Kaiju is Japanese for ‘Strange Beast’ and is used to refer to creatures like Godzilla, the Cloverfield monster, and most of what the original Power Rangers fought in Megazord form.  I admit, there’s something fun about watching a guy in a monster suit stepping on a cardboard city but on the whole it’s not for me.  Strike Two:  As to Mechs/Giant Robots, I loved Voltron as a kid but I’m not nostalgic about it and as an adult I care barely sit through the Rifftrax version of Transformers.  Strike Three: There might be good movie tie-in comic out there but I have yet to read one.  They are almost always superfluous junk.  Unfortunately, Tales from Year Zero didn’t change my opinion on any of these fronts.

In the Pacific Rim bad breath can be lethal!

I only had two reasons for bothering with Pacific Rim: Guillermo Del Toro and Idris Elba.  Neither person is involved with this comic but they both saw something in this project.  When it comes to Del Toro, he’s never let me down (although he came close with Blade 2).  Meanwhile, Idris Elba usually picks interesting projects (The Wire, Luther, and Prometheus to name a few).  All of that was enough that I was willing to leave my preconceptions at the door and give Pacific Rim Tales from Year Zero a chance.  I just wish I had been rewarded by that decision.

Little Known Fact: Kaiju hate Suspension Bridges but they love Truss Arch.

Pacific Rim Tales from Year Zero deals mostly with the impetus of the PPDC.  What is the PPDC you ask?  They are the world organization that defends the planet from Kaiju attacks.  You might be wondering what PPDC stands for.  I read the comic twice and I still can’t tell you.  Those initials are everywhere in the comic.  Places are labeled as PPDC facilities in the narration, PPDC logos are on jackets, uniforms, and buildings.  Characters mention the organization constantly.  I’ve scoured this comic from beginning to end and back again and the best I can tell you is that it might mean Pan Pacific Something Something.  Defense Counsel?  Defense Coalition? Dehydrated Cantaloupe?  I still don’t know.  If it’s in there I couldn’t find it.  This is really just the beginning of a longer list of inadequately answered / completely unanswered questions.  The simplest question is twofold:  Where do kaiju come from and why are they suddenly appearing regularly?  None of the scientists and military personnel we meet even suggest exploring that question.  In this fictional world is the answer so obvious that people don’t even find it worth discussing?  I know people have to be defended and that goal could easily force the questions of kaiju origin into the corner for a while but if you’re repeatedly attacked by an enemy eventually you have to go on the offensive.  The PPDC is all defense.  Apparently no one wants to win the war they just want to win a few battles.  This is just one of the ways Pacific Rim skims the surface of its concept.  Heaven forbid anything should get in the way of robots vs monsters.

The Pan Pacific Demarcated Cheese Jaeger Academy.

Travis Beacham is the concept creator.  He co-wrote the screenplay with Guillermo Del Toro but he’s flying solo on the comic.  The story is told as a series of interviews.  A reporter named Naomi Sokolov is assigned to write a retrospective article about kaiju and the PPDC called “Why We Fight”.  Tendo Choi is the first to be interviewed.  He was in San Francisco when the first kaiju arrived on what would later be called K-Day.  The second interview is with Dr. Schoenfeld who came up with the concept of fighting the kaiju with giant mechs.  (This is easily the best of the three stories).  The last interview is with Marshal Pentecost (Idris Elba’s character).  He explains anecdotally the relationship that mech co-pilots share.  Each man has a different perspective on “Why We Fight”.  Tendo’s figures there’s nothing else humanity could do, Dr. Schoenfeld suggests the answer is love, and Pentecost declares they fight to win (Hoorah!  But again how are you going to win without figured the where, why, how, etc of the enemy).  Ultimately, the fighting may be over though since it’s been decided to build a huge wall across all coast lines effectively locking the kaiju out at sea.  

Especially since my X-Box broke.  So we might as well fight and stuff.

Stupid Blood Tree!

The way the art in the comic is credited forces you to guess which artist is drawing which parts.  I mostly think they are listed in order but it’s not always clear when artists have switched.  In the final story the artists even swap out for about 3 pages in the middle for no apparent reason.  With this situation I hate to credit/criticize an artist by name since I’m not sure who did what.  I will just say that I was the least fond of whoever illustrated Tendo Choi’s story.  Their characters aren’t very consistent and the detail level drastically from panel to panel.  Meanwhile, the artwork on the overarching interview narrative was excellent.  One of the kaiju in the middle story “Turn the Tide” was especially bizarre in a fun way.  If this were an out and out anthology I would have loved to see extremely varied artwork but since this is situated as one coherent narrative I’m glad that the art was mostly consistent.  The problems I had with this comic had little to do with the art.

Overall Pacific Rim Tales from Year Zero is nothing special.  The story does what it’s supposed to do; it’s an appetizer.  It gets your taste buds going and hopefully you’re excited for the meal.  However, like most appetizers you really only buy it because you’re hungry now and you know your dinner might take a few minutes to arrive.  Unfortunately, also like most appetizers they are completely forgotten once your dinner arrives.  Worse than that, if Pacific Rim flops at the box office than Tales from Year Zero will disappear more completely than Jimmy Hoffa.  Hopefully, Del Toro has a few tricks up his sleeve.  Call me crazy but I still have high hopes for the entree.

Ever have that dream where spiders are crawling all over you?  Here it is Mech style

Grade: C -

Dexter 01

Title: Dexter 01

Series: Miniseries

Publisher: Marvel Comics

Publication Date: 2013

Creative Team:
            Writer: Jeff Lindsay

Artist: Dalibor Talajic

Cover: Mike Del Mundo

Genre: Suspence, Drama

Adapting a work to a different medium is like creating a parallel universe.  No adaptation really gets everything 100% the same.  How could it?  Every medium has strengths and weakness.  Before Michael C. Hall was Dexter there was only one universe; the universe of Darkly Dreaming Dexter and Dearly Devoted Dexter.  However, Showtime’s Dexter has taken on a life of it’s on and established a parallel universe far more well know than the original.  So the question on a lot of minds about Marvel’s new Dexter miniseries: Which Dexter is this?  For the answer, you need look no further than the series’ writer Jeff Lindsay.  Jeff Lindsay is Dexter’s creator and is personally adapting him for comics.  This may not be the Dexter most people are familiar with but at his heart he’s still just a serial killer of serial killers.

Both Dexters 'Dream Darkly' but only one was married to Jennifer Carpenter.

I’ve watched all of Showtime’s Dexter at least twice but to date the closest I’ve come to reading the books is my dusty copy of Darkly Dreaming Dexter sitting patiently on my To-Read pile. (I’m getting to it!  Back off!)  So my only real experience with the Dexter books is what a quick glance at Wikipedia could tell me.  I was a little worried that the comic would present some jarring changes.  I was aware that in the books Dexter’s Dark Passenger may be a real entity of some sort rather than just a poetic name for his need.  So far in the comic the Dark Passenger is represented as an exaggerated shadow that follows Dexter like a murderous grownup Peter Pan.  The other big change so far is to see Rita as she’s no longer in the Showtime series.  Otherwise, Dexter is much the same.  There are knives and blood slides.  I felt more at home in this parallel universe than I thought I would.

Rita finds Dexter's invitation to the Serial Killer Con and begins to get suspicious

The setup for Dexter’s first comic story isn’t too dissimilar from an episode of the TV show.  Dexter gets an invite to his High School reunion where a former classmate may be a target.  That is where the similarities end.  Dexter wants to avoid his reunion but his wife Rita decides they need to go.  (I have to say I like Rita on the TV show much better.  The book/comic Rita feels like more of a vacuous accessory than a person.  Anyway, back to our regularly scheduled program).  While there Rita begins to see that maybe Dexter didn’t really have any friends when he was younger.  Before this can sink in, Dexter’s old classmate Steve Gonzalez enters.  Steve used to bully Dexter.  Dexter retaliated in his own unique way and Steve never bothered him again.  However, Steve Gonzalez might have an idea of Dexter’s secret but it appears he might have a secret or two of his own.

Harry teaches conflict resolution through human physiology labs.

Jeff Lindsay keeps the comic form of Dexter infused with the same tension, macabre tone, and occasional dark humor that I’ve come to expect with the character.  It’s not always easy for a writer to transition to a different medium but Lindsay seems to have a solid grasp of the form.  One of the pitfalls of writers new to comics is the tendency to overdo it on dialogue and narration.  Lindsay realizes the strength of allowing art to tell a story and uses quite a few silent panels to set scenes and build tension.  This gives Dexter room to breathe and allows the audience the opportunity to guess at subtext.  It’s clear that Dexter and Mister Gonzalez are going to clash and there’s enough built into the story to make it worth coming back to see how that plays out.  I think my only real complaint writing wise is that occasionally there’s a little too much exposition in the dialogue but as this is the first chapter of the story I can let it slide.  Beyond that I also noticed while the exposition helped serve the plot, it didn’t really explain the overall concept.  This comic was definitely written with current fans rather than new fans in mind.  If you didn’t know anything about Dexter you could figure some of it out but you might be a little lost.

Dexter takes his wrath out on an unsuspecting Cutco salesmen.

There are several times in Dexter where I’m not really sure what I’m looking at.  As I mentioned before in the book series I had understood that Dexter’s Dark Passenger may be some kind of demon that shares Dexter’s physical form.  In the comic, this is represented as Dexter’s shadow.  However, sometimes other people are shown as this same shadowy form.  I’m not sure if this is how Dexter occasionally sees people or if this is a visual flourish to help emphasize what’s important in a scene.  I’m curious to see if this gets fleshed out any more as the series continues.  In either case, Dalibor Talajic does a great job of keeping things interesting.  It would be hard to visually re-define a group of characters that are already so well defined for a lot of people.  Talajic takes this challenge and draws consistent characters that feel right without making reference to their parallel universe TV counter parts.  (Even though I’ll admit I was still hearing Michael C. Hall’s voice in my head whenever I read Dexter’s lines).

Um....Yeah....I got nothing...

In recent years I’ve gravitated toward less superhero fare and more independent work so I haven’t spent as much time looking at Marvel Comics’ catalogue.  Since Marvel realizes there are people like me out there, over the last 10 years they’ve carved out a spot in their publishing line for literary adaptations.  They’ve published classical adaptations like Pride and Prejudice and their critically acclaimed The Wizard of OZ series.  They’ve also released more modern work like Ender’s Game: Battle Room and the Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series.  So as odd as it might initially seem Dexter is in good company at Marvel.

The line up for Marvel's new series, Literary Avengers!  Excelsior!

I wasn’t sure what to expect from a Dexter comic based on the book but I was happy with what I got.  There was a different sort of flavor than what I was used to but I like seeing different variations of characters I’m use to.  It helps to keep things fresh.  I’m excited to see what Lindsay has in store for Dexter at Marvel.  Perhaps if all goes well there could be more.

Miami Metro Homicide investigates more Cutco murders!

Grade: A