IDW Publishing 2015
Writer/Storytellers/Artist: Mark Waid & Peter Krause
Coloured by Nolan Woodard
Years ago, the city of St. Barrington was protected by the father-and-son crime fighting team of Nocturnus and Galahad. Eventually, however, the team broke up... in large part because Galahad blames Nocturnus for the death of Lauren Culver, his mother and Nocturnus’ wife.
There’s no drama like family drama right? However when your dad is a superhero and you’ve grown up as his sidekick it takes on a whole new meaning when your mother dies unexpectedly in a car accident where she ends up drowning. She wasn’t supposed to be alone that day but dad had things to do and begged off leaving the son to stew in his juices for way too long. Both have a section in their homes dedicated to the lost wife and mother and when her urn starts to bubble over with water and a mysterious message on her picture appears as a result the story takes a different turn.
I have to say that this isn’t like anything I could have expected and seeing Nocturnus still active in his suit and still showing signs of being somewhat defeated but still carrying on as if he doesn’t know what else to do is amazingly depicted. Also the cultural difference between him and his son and their methods only strengthen the fact that they operate on such different wavelengths. We see this as John reaches out to Lt. Rainwood for help in DNA analysis of the remains that wrote the message whereas his son holds a press conference calling the message out a call for help from his mother.
Galahad, or Jarod, uses twitter and social media as a way of spreading the message of what he’s doing to his followers so he doesn’t have to do as much legwork or detective work himself. Where as Dad would prefer not to put the general public even remotely in danger or to use them in such way, which he finds reprehensible. I love that we are seeing two sides of the story sure it seems a little drastic but it’s the modern age and the one that came before it. The use of social media can either be used for good purposes or it can abused where’s the fine line? After all phones these days record everything so taking advantage of the public’s desire to be a sideline hero is a slippery slope.
Switching gears we see a man getting home from work early as police are racing to a scene where they believe a serial killer has resurfaced. With the way this is laid out before us Mark manages to really throw you for a loop with this writing. Oh suddenly thanks to a huge twist here it would seem that the heroes aren’t the only ones who will be working together. I like the mysterious bad guy “recruiting” others for him and how this will tie together is anyones guess at this point but that’s a great thing it means we need to come back and find out.
Meanwhile father and son had rushed off to find Malvolia, a dangerous killer spotted by Galahad’s twitter followers. Oh yes this the kind of stuff you’d never think would happen and the characterization hits you like a ton of bricks and not in the way you expect it to and hell the last page even Malvolia is shocked by the turn of events! This is insane people you aren’t going to read anything like this anywhere else.
The interior artwork here is fantastic too. Peter keeps this full of emotion and you can feel what the characters feel wonderfully. Not to mention the use panels and page layouts that keep the visual moving along is incredibly well done. It’s detail is impressive and we have that classic feel of superhero comics which is simply fantastic to see.
A new age of crime fighting clashing with the old way with a mystery that pits father and son at odds with each other this is the new standard in comics.