Writer: Matt Kindt / Penciller: Wilfredo Torres / Colour Artist: Nayoung Kim / Letterer: Nate Piekos of Blambot / Dark Horse Comics
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19th February 2020
The Pitch: A best-of-the-best secret agent with memories he couldn't possibly possess, a mystery writer in her 60s who spends her retirement solving crimes, a man of action with mysterious drugs that keep him ahead of a constant string of targeted disasters, a seemingly omnipotent terrorist organization that might be behind it all...
Bang! Confused me on its way to my pull list. Up to the point I picked it up to actually read, I was convinced it was an Image book. Maybe it was the title, with its attention-grabbing exclamation point. Or its design, with the sound f/x burst on the cover and a back cover implying a meta world within. Or it could have been the cool concept, the idea of a secret agent who may not be who he thinks he is, a labyrinthine terrorist organisation that has been operating for decades... It's a great pitch, oozing in hip storytelling. So I was partially surprised to see this was a Dark Horse book. But as I began to think about all the great comics that DH have been putting out lately, I realised I shouldn't have been surprised at all. Dark Horse’s run of mini-series, especially Kill Whitey Donovan and She Could Fly, has been pretty damn solid.
KIDNT’S BOOKS HAVE TRACES OF BRADWAHING AND MIND-CONTROL. WHO KNOWS WHAT TRICKS HE’S PICKED UP ALONG THE WAY?
Bang! Sits comfortably on the shoulders of a lot of great fiction (most of it made it for television) without riding its coat-tails. Reading it, I could feel the ghosts of The Prisoner, The One Game and Fleming's Bond Novels, not to mention the pithy, breezy tone of Steed & Peel from The Avengers. There's a feel of '60s & '70s fiction and the paranoia inherent in those stories, even in the ones from outside that period. Bang! starts with a cocky, confident man, sure of who he is. It ends with that feeling in tatters. In a way, this feels like a revisionist relaunch of a book that died years before. Something that Morrison or Moore would have excelled at. It isn't of course, but it's a testament to Matt Kindt's talents that he convinces you otherwise. Kindt's books frequently have threads of mind control and brainwashing, so who knows what tricks he's picked up along the way?
Torres' art is, as always, tight. His style reminds me of Samnee and Fornes, seemingly light on detail but actually packed with information and energy. Kim's colours are pleasing and evocative, handling the shifts in the environment (and possibly, reality) really well but remaining consistent so you don't feel jarred. Piekos’ letters also shift well, giving you a real sense of voice. And Kindt even throws in a talking owl, reminding you of Mike Mignola's coterie of haunted and possessed animals that populate Hellboy's world. Bang! Is full of surprises, as its title suggests. I don't know what's coming, but I've got a sense I'm going to love it.
Buy Dark Horse comics here and support The Comic Crush.