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Post by Deleted on Jul 31, 2017 23:26:18 GMT -5
Fear Agent is one of my favorite newerish sci-fi series. It's run spans the border between the classic comic timeline we have set for the site and the modern era as defined by the site, so I am putting the review thread of the series here in the Modern Comics section even though the earliest issues are more than 10 years old. I am usually reluctant to do more review threads, as they can become work and suck the fun out of comics at times for me, but this is a finite series and I have gotten a bit of a bug to get back to writing and doing the reviews helps me get back into the swing of things, so I will be reviewing this series and most likely one other. And away we go... Fear Agent #1 Fear Agent #1 Cover Date: October 2005 Publisher: Image (collected editions available currently from Dark Horse) 32 pages, full color; $2.99 cover priceRead in Collected form in Fear Agents Vol. 1: Re-Ignition (Dark Horse edition)Cover Art: Tony Moore Writer: Rick Remender Pencils: Tony Moore Inks: Sean Parsons Colors: Lee Loughridge Letters: Russell Wooten Synopsis: Heath Hudson is an alien hunter-for-hire from Texas, part of a team of Alien Hunters known as the Fear Agents. He is also an alcoholic and has a penchant for quoting Samuel Clemens. He has been hired by an expeditionary force on a planet who until recently got along with the primitive natives, but lately they have been raiding the camp stealing terraforming equipment. Heath has been hired to recover the equipment, and tracks the primitive Neanderthal-like aliens to their lair in a cave system. What can go wrong, does go wrong for Heath, and he blunders his way through a fight and discovers the primitives are being mind-controlled by a superior alien species that is using the parts and the mind-controlled aliens to build itself a rocketship to get off the planet. Heath escapes the creatures mental domination, but his attempt to subdue it and recover the equipment goes to hell and he ends up blowing up the alien to save his skin. All good, except it’s against intergalactic code for humans to kill class A intelligent species like that creature, so he’s stepped out of the frying pan and into the fire. Meanwhile, a transport arrives at large space station to find it is abandoned and the pilot discovers that something nasty waits in the space station. Commentary: In many ways this book owes its roots to classic EC sci-fi comics and still has the look and feel of a modernized version of such, complete down to the space bubble helmet used by the Fear Agents. Remender has started to lay the foundation of a rich sci-fi world filled with danger and adventure, and his characters have that bitter, snarky sense of humor and disillusionment the is his forte, but also fits with the tone of those disillusioned with the façade of progress and prosperity of the 1950s that was layered below the surface of a lot of the EC sci-fi tales. Tony Moore’s storytelling is superb and his stylized artwork fits well with the world Remender is building and the tone and feel of the story. There’s a lot to take in from his settings and landscapes, and his staging of action sequences works really well. It looks and feels different from his early Walking Dead stuff to me. All in all a solid first issue that tells a story that has a beginning, middle and end, but sets up a larger story that is just beginning. Ratings Story: 9/10 Art: 8/10 Overall: 9/10 -M |
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Post by Deleted on Jul 31, 2017 23:30:50 GMT -5
and onto #2 because well, I wanted to start with a bang... Fear Agent #2 Fear Agent #2 Cover Date: November 2005 Publisher: Image (collected editions available currently from Dark Horse) 32 pages, full color; $2.99 cover priceRead in Collected form in Fear Agents Vol. 1: Re-Ignition (Dark Horse edition)Cover Art: Tony Moore Writer: Rick Remender Pencils: Tony Moore Inks: Sean Parsons Colors: Lee Loughridge Letters: Russell Wooten Synopsis: The colonists in the expeditionary force refuse to pay Heath because the situation was bungled and he has to leave in a hurry to prevent further nastiness. On his rocket, he spars with Annie, the female personality of his ships computer and realizes he has just enough credits to reach the next space station (the one we saw in issue #1) but not enough to refuel or resupply the ship. An old acquaintance he is not on the best of terms with contacts Heath with a job offer, to investigate why the space station has gone radio dead and clean out any alien menace. Heath wants to refuse but accepts out of desperation. He arrives and finds the station has been infested by a species called Feeders. Things go to hell as usual, and Heath finds another survivor, a rocket scientist named Mara. From her, he learns the Feeders were brought to the station by a race called the Dressites, a race Heath fought in the Anubis Conflicts, an intergalactic war the Fear Agents fought in. The infestation was a test, and the Dressites next target for the Feeders is Earth. Commentary: The plot kicks into high drive this issue. Remender gives us more depth to Heath’s character, and Annie the computer is a wonderful foil used to bring a lot of that out. Mara fills that role very well once she is introduced as well. We get a much better feel for Heath and why he is the way he is, and the big bad plot that will drive the series is put into full swing this issue. Moore is still firing on all cylinders, and Moore’s strengths for plotting and characterization shine in this issue. The story feels big and Heath feels ill equipped to handle it, but that is what makes this look like a fun ride that is about to be embarked on. It’s obvious Heath knows a lot more about this world than we do at this point, and more than Mara when he meets her, but he’s not omniscient and is prone to screwing up despite best intentions, and we learn more as he interacts with the people and places of the world Remender is building, and start to empathize with the protagonist as the trials and tribulations start to pile up. It does well to hook us in and promise us a thrill ride. RatingsStory: 10/10 Art: 8/10 Overall: 9/10 -M |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 1, 2017 16:15:58 GMT -5
Fear Agent #3 Fear Agent #3 Cover Date: February 2006 Publisher: Image (collected editions available currently from Dark Horse) 32 pages, full color; $2.99 cover priceRead in Collected form in Fear Agents Vol. 1: Re-Ignition (Dark Horse edition)Cover Art: Tony Moore Writer: Rick Remender Pencils: Tony Moore Inks: Mike Manley Colors: Lee Loughridge Letters: Russell Wooten Synopsis: Out of the frying pan and into the fire. Heath and Mara manage to get aboard Heath’s rocket and prepare to flee to earth to warn them of the Dressite plot. Annie informs him she has refueled while he was in there, so they should have enough fuel to reach Earth. The Dressites though, are aware of Heath and let him go because they have tainted the fuel, as Annie soon discovers to their chagrin. The warp overpowers and bends space and they crash on an unknown ice planet. They survive, but the rocket explodes after impact, and worse there is a horde of killer robots hunting them down. After a few misadventures, they escape using Heath’s jet pack, but are then shot down by an alien race native to the cold… Commentary: The plot thickens, as we learn how deliberately the Dressites have planned this, and their cunning is not to be underestimated. Remender kicks up the action to a breakneck pace in this issue, to the point where the danger is relentless and Heath and Mara are put through their paces, and we learn a lot about their character through the way they react to the danger and to each other. This is a perfect display of show don’t tell in developing the characters. Moore’s art is well suited for the frenetic pace of the action and your eyes move through it with an alacrity that enhances the experience of the fast paced action. It is worth a second, slower look at the art after you read the story to drink in all the wonderful details and design that is in each page and panel. I think I like Manley’s inks better than Parsons’ but it’s close. Ratings: Story: 10/10 Art 9/10 Overall 9/10 -M
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Post by Deleted on Aug 2, 2017 13:13:27 GMT -5
Fear Agent #4 Fear Agent #4 Cover Date: May 2006 Publisher: Image (collected editions available currently from Dark Horse) 32 pages, full color; $2.99 cover priceRead in Collected form in Fear Agents Vol. 1: Re-Ignition (Dark Horse edition)Cover Art: Tony Moore Writer: Rick Remender Pencils: Tony Moore, Jerome Opena Inks: Mike Manley Colors: Lee Loughridge Letters: Russell Wooten Synopsis: Heath and Mara are taken in by the primitive tribe of ice savages once the tribe realizes they are flesh and blood and not robots. The tribe treats their wounds and Heath and Mara learn they have travelled through time as well as space to the planet that has spawned the Tetaldans, a race the invaded Earth and wiped out most of Heath’s family. Heath conceives a plan to change history, but as always, things go horribly wrong… Commentary: The plot ratchets up and we learn more of the world building background, the history of Earth in the future. We also get a look into Heath’s make up and the darkness he houses within because of the pain he suffered in losing his family. Remender is pulling out all the stops examining several sci-fi tropes, but waving them together in a unique tapestry that is an entertaining thrill ride. This issue is the exit of Tony Moore and Jerome Opena comes on, the transition this issue is a little rough, but it is a net gain for the series. Moore did great work, but Opena’s work can hit epic notes of scale needed for the larger scale the series is heading towards. The schedule slipped on the book, and I am assuming that is why Moore was replaced/stepped down, but I don’t know for certain. This wraps up the first volume of Fear Agent, and it ends on one helluva cliffhanger. Ratings: Story 9/10 Art 8/10 Overall 9/10 -M
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Post by Deleted on Aug 22, 2017 16:00:34 GMT -5
I'm going to switch up and do the reviews by trade rather than by issue here. To that end... Fear Agent Volume 2: My War Writer: Rick Remender Artist: Jerome Opena Colorist: Michelle Masden Letterer: Rus Wooten contains issues #5-10 covers by Tony Moore      Synopsis: Heath's plan went to hell and he is fighting for his life and losing. The fight leads him to a long fall into the sea where he is dying, but he is taken by a race of intelligent jellyfish brains. They want to find out more about him so grow him a new clone body and place his brain in it. He eventually convinces him to help him stop the Tataldans and seems to have removed their threat, but Mara is killed in the battle. Heath escapes, but is captured by the Keepers, a kind of space-time continuum constabulary who arrest Heath for his tampering with time and restore the timeline to what is was supposed to be. At his trial he sees a clone of Mara and learns she has survived in a way too. He rots in prison for a while and becomes addicted to narcotics, until the Keepers change their verdict because they need Heath to return to Earth. He does, with Mara's clone in tow, but it is part of a secret Dressite plot to use Heath to get past Earth's defenses. On the trip, Heath gets clean and soberish, and he and Mara hook up. He gets to Earth to find it devastated by the Dressites and overrun by Feeders. He seeks some sign of his wife Charlotte and we learn of the fate of his family in the Dressite invasion through flashbacks. He loses hope and tries to stage a suicidal battle with the Dressies but is rescued by a new group of Fear Agents, led by Charlotte's new husband, and she is president of the resistance, which has their base on the moon. They need Heath's help but he is reluctant to help them out of bitter jealousy and guilt, but the Dressites are coming unknown to them, and they have an agent inside the base...Mara. Commentary: This is really seat of the pants sci-fi adventure at a rapid pace for most of it. But when it slows down, we get good character development of Heath He really is a shitty person with a heart of gold, usually trying to do the right thing for the right reasons but going about it all wrong and screwing things up. He catches a lot of breaks, but squanders a lot of opportunities. Opena's art here is phenomenal. The scale of the action is epic without ever losing the personal individual touch on the characters. HE draws form a lot of sci-fi visual tropes for aliens and ship desings, but it feels fresh and current. Ratings Story 8/10 Art 9/10 Overall 9/10 -M |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2017 18:15:27 GMT -5
Fear Agent Vol. 3: The Last Goodbye Writer: Rick Remender Pencils & covers: Tony Moore Inks: Andre Parks & Rick Remender Colors: Lee :oughridge Letters: Rus Wooten collecting issues #12-15 (originally released as Fear Agent: The Last Goodbye #1-4, but counted as issues 12-15 of the original series) *issue 11 is skipped, it was a standalone Tales of the Fear Agents story and is collected in the Tales of the Fear Agents volume, rather than in sequence with the main story collected in the Fear Agent trades. There was no #16, instead Tales of the Fear Agent one-shot is counted as #16, and the series resumes with #27 after the Last Goodbye mini.      Synopsis: This mini goes back and tells the origin of how Heath Huston becomes a Fear Agent. It is done as a flashback as Heath and Mara talk after the events of #10 as Heath remembers what happened. The earth is invaded. Heath's father and son are killed in the initial bombardment and he and Charlotte fight to survive and escape against Dressites and Taltadans who vie agianst each other with Earth as the battlefield and earthlings as collateral damage. After many trials and tribulations, Heath and Charlotte find reguge with friends and neighbors in a fallout shelter and wait out a few months. One of those trapped within is the local crazy George, who was an alien conspiracy nit and knows all about the Dressites and Taltadians and their war and feels vindicated because people now know he was right and now crazy, which creates tension in the shelter. Heath has had enough and opens up the shelter and leads them on a quest for food. More tribulations, casualties and alien encounters follow, as they meet up with other local resistance fighters and eventually organize themselves into the Fear Agents. After getting more info and recovering some alien tech, they are in a position to use a gateway to strike the Dressite base on the moon, where they have an antiTaltadian weapon ready to turn the war in their favor, but it all goes to hell as Goerge has sold them out to the aliens. The Dressites disable to robotic Taltadians, and the battle goes badly for the earthmen, and they are desperate, and Heath takes a tanker of slug repellent deadly to the Dressites through the portal to their home-world wiping out the native Dressite population in an act of genocide. The Dressites withdraw from Earth and the United Systems arrive to offer aid and succor, but they learn the Dressite military was invited to earth by the United Systems to oppose the Taltadian incursion bt had gone rogue and was opposed byt he Dressite homeworld, so Heath had committed genocide on those who did not oppose earth. His guilt eats him alive and Charlotte leaves him over this. Heath heads out to space as a Fear Agent alien hunter for hire because he feels he has no place on Earth anymore. The flashback ends and we return to the present as Mara walks away from Heath who has ignored her lost in thought. Commentary: Tony Moore returns to the art, I prefer Opena' stuff, but Moore is very, very good here. He has a grittier feel, Opena is a little smoother, but that grit feels right for this story, as there is nothing clean about it. Remender really digs in and shows up humanity at their best and worst during the invasion, more worst than best on balance though. He also really digs into Heath's character and we see exactly how he becomes the broken man we were introduced to in issue 1. Heath is a fighter, and he never gives up no matter how much he wants to at times, but he also never takes time to think things throw and often makes things worse instead of better despite his best efforts. He lets anger and desperation get the better of him and is a viper's nest of flaws and vices that all seem to get the best of him and limit his ability to achieve his goals. He often finds a way to fight his way to a win, but the price if victory is often costly, many times too costly. Yet still he finds a way to fight on. You can't really feel sorry for him, because he brings it upon himself, but you can't really root against him either, as he tries to do the right thing despite how much he sets himself up for failure again and again. He's not a lovable loser or a tragic hero, he's a fascinating bundle of contradictions too stubborn or stupid to give up and too ornery to care what anyone but Charlotte thinks of him. RatingsStory 8/10 Art 8/10 Overall 8/10 -M
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2017 23:30:03 GMT -5
Fear Agent Volume 4: Hatchet Job collects issues #17-21 (now published by Dark Horse, formerly from Image)Writer: Rick Rememnder Art: Jerome Opena (17-19) Kieron Dwyer w/Jerome Opena finishes (20-21) Colors: Michelle Madsen Letters: Rus Wooten Covers: Jerome Opena (17-20), Tony Moore (21)      Synopsis: Charlotte and her new husband Keith divide the Fear Agents into 2 groups to take on 2 missions. Keith will lead a group to the Feeders' homeworld to try to find a natural predator for them to bring back to earth the rid the earth of the Feeder infestation, while Charlotte will lead a group in search of an inhabitable world for Earth's refugees to settle on in case Earth cannot be saved. Mara accompanies Charlotte while Heath goes with Keith's crew. Heath takes Keith aboard his ship for a pit stop on a world where they can store up on provisions, but they run into trouble, and are captures by a civilization who hates humans for what they did to the Dressites (not knowing Heath was the perpetrator of the genocide and in their custody) and believe Heath and Keith are spies. While in custody, Keith reveals that Charlotte was pregnant when he left Earth all those years ago and they have a daughter named Eden. Heath is upset they hid this form him but part of him understands why. Their captors force Heath and Keith to battle in an arena and Keith throws himself on Heath's spear to give he and Charlotte (and Eden) a chance at reconciliation because he loves Charlotte but knows he was just a place holder until Heath came back if he ever did and that she still loves him. Meanwhile Mara deceives the crew and leads them to a planet where she knows a pirate crew is based, the pirate captain is the man who sold her family into slavery and she is plotting revenge against him. We learn about her years in captivity through a flashback and see how the Dressites saved her and convinced her to help them get to Earth and begin their plan of vengeance against Heath. They arrive and Mara foolishly attacks the better armed pirates leading to disaster as their ship is shot down and crashes on the surface of the planet, with very few survivors. They are attacked by the soul sucking zombie remnant of that planet's civilization, all that is left of them because they committed mass suicide in an attempt to ascend to godhood through the auspices of a recurring black hole above their planet. Heath and the other Fear Agents receive the distress signal and hurry to save Charlotte's crew. Heath tells them Keith is dead, but not how he dies. Heath arrives and saves Charlotte but the rest of the crew is believed dead, except for Mara who fled and tries to sneak aboard the pirate ship. Heath gets Charlotte to safety and goes after Mara, now knowing of her betrayal. He arrives as she confronts the pirate captain, but lets her die by the pirate's hand. His reward is being shot into space without a helmet by the Pirates. He is saved by the jellyfish brain who saved him previously, who reveals he is a chronal anomaly and the last hope to rectify a great crisis. He gives Heath a device as Charlotte and crew arrive oto bring Heath in alive, but none saw the jellyfish brain. Meanwhile we learn the Taladians are working with rebel Keepers (the dudes keeping space time intact) to maintain the timeline Heath destroyed but it is getting more difficult to maintain and a great crisis is coming. The Taladians were also behind Heath and Keith's capture and arena sentence. We also learn of Andi, a huan survivor on the Dressite world from the time of Heath;s genocidal attack who blames Heath for abaondoninghr and wants revenge. She now works with the Dressites and infiltrates the moon base to abduct Eden. AS Heath and the crew get ready to depart, the ship intercepts a broadcast of the arena fight and it looks like Heath kills Keith, it is not apparent Keith threw himself on it. No one believes Heath's explanation and Charlotte wants him gone. Heath leaves and Charlotte's ship warps out. Heath is about to do the same when he gets a distress signal form one of Charlotte's crew that was believed dead but has managed to survive. He flies to the rescue and manages to get the crew member on board saving him form the zombies when the black hole reappears. Heath cannot escape it and tries to fly into it and ricochet off, but he gets caught and is rapidly aging and desperately activates the device the jellyfish brain gave him and everything goes white... Commentary: There is so much going on here. Every issue is just jam packed with action, twists, turns, heartache, and new revelations. All of it is deftly handled by Remender, Dwyer and Opena. The visuals are like playing in a sci-fi toy box. Flying fish mounts through a sci-fi city floating above a lava flow, space zombies, lost citadels, jellyfish brains, robots, aliens, space pirate battles, Flash Gordon style rocket ships, and black hole trippy visuals. It is a treat to read. There are layers of plots here and every time you peel back one layer there is another. It's so densely packed, no decompressed storytelling here, it's mile-a-minute action and plot twists with small breaks for deep character development. It's fun and fascinating at the same time. RatingsStory 10/10 Art 10/10 Overall 10/10 -M
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