The Ultimates
is the latest series of adventures of Marvel Comics’s alternate universe
Avengers, and it’s quite good. There’s not need to beat around the bush on this
one, especially since the comic itself wastes no time. With the very first
issue the creative team composed of writer Jonathan Hickman, artist Esad Ribic
and colourist Dean White, jump right into the story. Even from the very first
page they manage to hook the reader and those who continued reading were not
disappointed.
The story, once you break it down, is rather simple. A villainous
genius, The Maker, creates impressive evolutionary pressure cooker somewhere on
the European continent and it threatens the planet. Nick Fury, commander of
SHIELD, and his Ultimates are unable to deal with this thread and compounded with
other global catastrophes they are nearly completely defeated. There have been
several similar stories in superhero comics but the creative team manages not
only to make it fresh but also succeed in making the threat feel real. The only
possible conclusion here appears to be the collapse o
f both the Ultimates,
SHIELD and several world governments.
The first comic I read with Esad Ribic on art was the
opening story arc of Uncanny X-Force.
He has a different style than many artists working in mainstream comic. There’s
a European vibe to his art and I like it. He’s well suited to smaller character
moments as he is big action sequences and that’s exactly the kind of balance in
storytelling that makes a good team superhero book. That compounded with the
fact that Ribic’s art simply looks good makes him an excellent choice for this
title. My only complaint is that sometimes, when there’s a lot of action, his
panels can get a little too packed with art and details but it’s difficult to
criticism because he still manages to make it look good. I love the way he
draws Thor. I think the Ultimate Universe has my favourite Thor look and it’s
mostly because of the beard. I love Thor with a thick beard. It’s better than a
goatee and it’s significantly better than the wimpy beard Thor has in the
Marvel movieverse. I think Thor looks good without the beard in regular Marcel
continuity but here in the Ultimate Universe, the beard is able to excel in
part because of the difference in tone.
You can’t talk about Ribic’s art on this book without
mentioning Dean White’s colours. He’s an excellent colourist. He’s not my
favourite but he has such great skill that it’s impossible to ignore his
contributions to the art. He’s very versatile and his colours look very
different here than they did on Uncanny
X-Force. It was good then but I think it’s better here, simply out of
personal preference. The colours of The
Ultimates manage to incorporate the vibrant colours and sense of wonder of
superhero comics but it’s also grounded in the 21st Century pseudo
reality of the Ultimate Universe line of titles. I can’t recall reading another
comic that was coloured by White other than books also drawn by Ribic and
that’s fine because I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather see colour Ribic’s
art. They’re an impressive collaboration
and their work definitively helps to elevate the story.
Hickman has become a prominent writer at Marvel in the
last five years. He’s written fan favourite and acclaimed runs (Fantastic Four
is a good example) and he’s become one of the Marvel Architects which
essentially means he’s proved himself as a writer and now Marvel gives him
access to their most popular properties. Hickman is currently the writer of the
recently relaunched Avengers and New Avengers. I haven’t had a chance to
read either of those yet but I have a feeling it would be more difficult for Hickman
to write a story like the one in The
Ultimates. For starters the tone of the regular Marvel Universe and the
Ultimate Universe are very different. There’s a sense of danger in The Ultimates that would be nearly
impossible to match in a regular Marvel book because the writers are limited in
what they can do. Yes there can be stories that change things but at the end of
the day the characters and the titles are a product that has to remain
recognizable. If you look at the characters and the world of the Ultimate
Universe today compared to the first few years after it launched, very few
things remain the same.
That’s probably one of my complaints, actually. So much
has changed that sometimes it’s difficult to know which character is who, what they’ve
done and how they’re different from their Marvel Universe counterpart. For
examples, when Thor was first introduced in Mark Millar’s The Ultimates, he was a man pretending to be a god but then he
actually became Thor God of Thunder. Now in Hickman’s run he no longer has his
godly powers but not quite, now he potentially has more than ever before
because he’s the living incarnation of Valhalla. . . or something. See what I
mean? Things in the Ultimate Universe have gotten complicated over time and despite
some ok to mediocre comics in the line there are some real gems. What’s great
about The Ultimates is that Hickman
doesn’t even use all the team members in this first volume. Instead he has
several other secondary as well as tertiary Marvel Universe characters into the
mix. A smart move that has already paid off in this volume and I’m convinced
will continue to do so in the second part of the story.
Hickman, Ribic and White tell a thrilling,
no-holds-barred superhero comic and expect you to keep up. I love comics that
are dense and quick, I love comics that challenge me. With Ultimate Comics: The Ultimates my ability as comics reader and my
knowledge of Marvel’s Ultimate Universe are challenged while my cravings for
intelligent, well-crafted and interesting superhero comics are satisfied. The Ultimates isn’t a run of the mill
smash ‘em up comics spoon fed to you by a barely sub average writer, this is
the real deal and I’d recommend you check it out.
 |
| Click to enlarge. |
No comments:
Post a Comment