This issue reads distressingly fast. Without even establishing the character he’s focusing on, Fialkov skips to the future. He might just open in the future. He definitely doesn’t establish the letter from the future angle well enough. Something about how he’s telling the story, it just doesn’t seem like a letter. Maybe because every couple pages he’s jumping a year into the future.
The future stuff is vaguely interesting, but it’s all exposition. Fialkov hasn’t actually moved the story ahead–in its present action–from the previous issue. Maybe previous two. They’re all tied together, which would be awesome if he sold it to television, but in print he’s just dragging things out.
He’s also weak in his character relationships. None of these people are believable as friends. He doesn’t write them with any history.
It’s still an okay read, with nice art, but it’s crumbling only four issues in.
CREDITS
Growth; writer, Joshua Hale Fialkov; artist, Joe Infurnari; publisher, Hoarse and Buggy Productions.
In this issue, Fialkov gives the first sustained look at life in the post-apocalyptic world the main cast creates. There’s not a lot, mostly because Fialkov wants to keep a big reveal (but it’s not really important so far) for the last scene. So there are bits and pieces and Infurnari does something really cool with how he transitions through time. He goes from lots of detail to a sketch, then into the new time period. It’s neat.
For the second issue, which is really mostly flashbacks structured around one of the character’s letter from her future self and talking heads scenes, Fialkov goes really dark. The flashback is darker than the present day stuff, but the present day stuff has these moments of intense, unexpected violence.
Where to start with The Bunker. First, I guess Joe Infurnari’s art. It’s a really neat mix of comedic and post-apocalyptic. Wonderful ink washes. And Infurnari really uses the “widescreen” format well (it’s a digital exclusive so he’s drawing for tablet proportions).