Ah, the systems of a human imagined afterlife… such compelling ideas, such boring narrative. Fialkov does have some all right ideas and Gabo does illustrate them well, but The Life After is stumbling.
The protagonist–Jude (still maybe for Jesus, but Fialkov’s waiting)–and his sidekick–Hemingway, who makes references to the Spanish Civil War in about the only subtle thing Fialkov does–walk through purgatory some more. They aren’t exploring, they aren’t searching. They’re wandering. And the comic is a little lost.
Fialkov’s biggest problem as a writer seems to be a lot of good ideas, some really good characterizations and no idea how to marry the two into a narrative. The comic isn’t exactly boring; instead, it’s meandering.
When Fialkov does get to the cliffhanger–after teasing a huge action sequence and then not delivering–it’s decidedly unexciting. Cliffhangers need to be parts of compelling narratives after all.
B-
CREDITS
Writer, Joshua Hale Fialkov; artist and colorist, Gabo; letterer, Crank!; editors, James Lucas Jones and Ari Yarwood; publisher, Oni Press.
Fialkov is keeping his cards covered but it certainly appears one possibility for The Life After is the protagonist is Jesus reincarnated in Limbo to free the souls imprisoned due to their earthly suicides. Or he's the anti-Christ and he's doing just about the same thing.
What a downer. Not because of the big reveal at the end, but because of how writer Joshua Hale Fialkov compares the mundanity to normal existence to purgatory. For a while, it seems like The Life After is just a gentle Matrix riff, with some often really good art from Gabo. The art's not always great, but it's always competent and the ambitious stuff makes up for the rest.
Skyman is real close to being in my “why would I want to read this” stack. It’s generally okay. The art is strange–mainstream superhero with angst; it’s unclear if Manuel Garcia isn’t doing enough on the pencils and Bit has to fill in on the inks or if Bit is inking in the Sturm und Drang.
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.
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).
