Writer/Artist: Jeff Lemire
August 2013
Vertigo Comics
"Chapter 1: The Scientist":
I'm a sucker for Jeff Lemire. Everything from his early creator-owned comics like Lost Dogs and Essex County to his recently concluded Sweet Tooth series and his current writer-only series Animal Man for DC all tickle my fancy (it's really quite funny). Trillium is the first series of Lemire's creator-owned work that I've actually been able to read monthly and I couldn't be a happier camper cause of it. Anyways, enough dribble-drabble.
I immediately get the vibes of a classic Sci-Fi story with this chapter. It evokes the feel of stories like H.G. Wells' The Time Machine and Robert A. Heinlein's Starship Troopers and others that I can't think of at the moment (it's been a long, rainy, mellow Hallowe'en) mixed with something new. I really appreciate that the protagonist is a female (western society could really do with some more female leads, especially in the comic book reading world).
There is a lot of set up in this issue, but that is a very forgiving factor since Lemire is world-building in this completely new series. A positive that comes from this is that the reader feels thrown right into the story; Lemire doesn't waste time with exposition and filler. However, I found it a lot to take it on the first read, so I reread the issue again to refresh things (a couple months later nonetheless...). Nika (the scientist) feels like a loner to me. Her only companion so far has been her A.I. (named Essie) that is built into her suit. Her higher-up, Commander Pohl, does not gel well with Nika and so far the only other person of importance in Nika's life is her deceased mother, who we see several times through the story. This lone-wolf aspect to Nika has me intrigued and I'm interested to see what she makes of her encounter with the alien species and the special someone she runs into (surprise surprise!).
This book has a political undercurrent running through it. The premise of the intruder occupying new territory is prevalent throughout and is rather mysterious at the moment. We'll have to wait and see how this plays out. The later scene with Nika's interaction with the alien species had me a bit nervous the entire time... that splash page was phenomenal. Jeffy's artwork has a slightly different feel to it with this miniseries. For one, he's colouring a good portion of it (note the water colours). I love the watercolour feel, however there's something about the inking. I'm being a bit nit-picky, but there are certain pages that felt off to me and could have used some more finesse. Colour choice-wise, the book is awesome, especially the scenes with the aliens in tow. The blue contrasted with reds, browns, and grays looked exceptionally beautiful.
"Chapter 1.2: The Soldier":
This chapter also evokes the fear of the "Other" that is common to SF stories ("the strange and savage natives..."). The cross-imagery of the bird resembling a plane to William's (the soldier) mind is neat. Lemire utilizes telling two stories at once here quite nicely. This story was easier to digest as there was less text to try to make sense of; the first chapter, especially the single splash page, felt a bit too wordy for me. I realized from reading this chapter that my beef above about the slight change in presentation of Lemire's art is that it looks cleaner than I'm used to. The line work looks neater compared to some of Jeff's other works. It looks fantastic as Jeff's art always does, I guess I prefer his more messy style. Just a minor gripe!
I'm running short of thoughts here... the Other is an obvious motif in both these stories and it's interesting to see how both Nika and William's encounters with alterity/difference lead them to each other (yet another encounter with the other). Perhaps I'll rewrite this when I have more energy and interesting things to say.
No comments:
Post a Comment