If You Don’t Read This, You Don’t Know Jack
TPB: Battlin' Jack Murdock
Writer: Zeb Wells
Artist: Carmine Di
Giandomenico
Price: $12.99
Battlin’ Jack Murdock isn’t a
book I would normally pick up. Books
retelling a hero’s origin always seem to make one of two mistakes. The first is playing the origin too true to
character and failing to make a compelling case for picking it up. The second is trying to rewrite an origin to
make the story something new but then annoying the fans of the original origin who
are the book’s target audience in the first place.
The reason I did pick up this
trade in particular has to do with Zeb Wells writing it. He first came onto my radar with the amazing
Carnage USA mini last year but he’s written a lot before that including
various Spider-man titles, Anti-Venom and the amazing Necrosha event in
X-force. Carmine Di Giandomenico is
someone I hadn’t heard of before (I’m sure I’d remember stuttering through that
name on the cast if I had) but he’s mostly worked for Marvel’s Italian
publisher. Di Giandomenico also co-wrote
the book with Wells.
In this four issue mini all
narrated from Jack Murdock’s perspective, we see the boxer in the ring of the
fight that he has been paid to throw.
Since most people familiar with Daredevil know how that particular
chapter ends, the bulk of the story is told in flashbacks. The trade details Jack’s alcohol fueled fall
from grace as a boxer and his second career as an enforcer for a low-level
mobster. Eventually, Jack’s pangs of
conscience become too loud to ignore and he cleans up his act to re-enter the
ring.
Zeb Wells again wowed me with
this book. The story avoids both pitfalls I detailed earlier by sticking mostly
to script but fleshing out Jack as a sympathetic but fallible human being in
search of redemption. It avoids the
temptation to feature Matt Murdock any more than it has to ground Jack’s
experience to Matt’s major milestones. A
final revelation that Jack has at the story’s close helps to add to the origin
story without changing it considerably.
The art in the book is
excellent and really shines during the boxing scenes where droplets and
eventually steams of blood hang in the air with amazing realism. The lines on Jack’s face and graying temples
are great little touches which convey the hard life that Jack has lived. The overall art seems close to cover quality
and compares favorably to Clayton Crain’s work, that being just about the
highest compliment I could give.
Final rating (out of 5):
Great review, Ken! Sounds like a real sleeper book that many people have passed over. Thanks for drawing attention to this. I made a mental note to check it out (most likely it will get added to the pile and wait for me like all the other neglected items on my pile - - my problem, but not the worst one to have!)
ReplyDeleteThanks Mike. The storytelling and art in this book really set it apart. It had been sitting neglected in my pile for probably over 3 years when I wrote this.
ReplyDelete