Radiant Comics

I’m back from the comic shop this week and I got no new comics but I did get a rather expensive hard cover collection:

And now for a review of something I’ve read recently.

“Union Jack: London Falling” by Christos N. Gage and Mike Perkins

Here is another trade paperback collection pulled from the pile of Marvel TPBs that a friend gave me. It collects the first four issues of “Union Jack” from 2006.

Union Jack is an English super hero who has worked, in the past, for British secret intelligence or whatever spy agency they got over there in the U.K. Marvel universe. In this story, though he is no longer active with the spy agency, he is called upon to help defend London from terrorists. Super villains who were hired as terrorists to be precise. Union Jack teams up with a few other no name super heroes/agents from around the world to make an international team.

I’ve seen Perkins’ art before and it’s usually pretty good. He uses an illustrative photo realist style that falls just a little short of some of the top shelf photo realistic guys out there. Still, next to top shelf is good enough for me and he tells a good story. He would have been helped out if the coloring was a little bit better too. Not that it was terrible either. Despite these criticisms there is nothing wrong with the art. It’s good stuff.

Maybe it’s because I just read “Global Frequency” or maybe it’s because I’ve read a lot of stories, sort of, like this (including Gage’s run on Storm Watch) but I found this book a bit of a downer. It was probably just me being tired of realpolitik stories. Governments versus terrorists with neither having clearly defined values or goals doesn’t make for a satisfying story.

At least Union Jack had a problem with it all too. He is a hero and wasn’t always happy with the boss of the spy agency’s actions. He certainly wasn’t happy with super villains hiring themselves out to terrorists (whoever they were). There was also a “Union Jack: Hero to the Working Man” theme going on in the book to counter the realpolitik stuff.

I’m also a little tired of the whole “Super hero with no super powers takes on super powered people and beats them with his craftiness” thing. In a real fight the guy who is a little bit stronger and faster usually wins. Here we have guys who are multiple times stronger and faster losing to weaker opponents. I just don’t believe it. That’s why I also can’t stand Batman stories a lot of the time.

This was a well done book all things considered. I just wasn’t into the story it had to tell. If that sort of thing is what you like then give it a read.