Buddy’s life is never simple or relaxed even when he wishes it would be.
What They Say:
Buddy Baker has gone from “super” man to family man–but is he strong enough to hold his family together when Maxine, his young daughter, starts to manifest her own dangerous powers? Find out in this dramatic new series from writer Jeff Lemire (SWEET TOOTH) and artist Travel Foreman.
The Review:
The return of Animal Man to his own book was something that I was utterly excited by when the relaunch news started coming out. I’d thoroughly enjoyed his character in the pre-Vertigo days with Grant Morrison weaving a fascinating story that was ahead of its time in a lot of ways. When Buddy Baker became one of the central figures of Countdown, it was one of the reasons I kept up with that series as faithfully as I did because I really like the character and the fact that he is a family man. And with DC Comics rewriting a lot of relationships in its shared universe here for the relaunch, I was doubly glad to see that his family survived and that Ellen, Maxine and Cliff were all front and center for all of this. Family is utterly central to Buddy’s life and as we see in this opening issue, he’s allowed to do all that he does because of them and especially because of his wife.
With Buddy having had a pretty varied career as a superhero in the last three years, we get an interview as the first page here that clues us into the fact that he’s kind of moved on from it in order to do an indie movie that was highly appropriate for him. But in reading the interview later on, he really finds himself coming across badly there and that has him already thinking he needs to do something else. And that something else is the draw back to being a superhero on some level, which coincides well with a hostage situation in the children’s wing of the local hospital. This action plays heavily to the family theme as it pushes Buddy to thinking about what he could lose himself over the course of living, and it’s a bit heavy handed and coincidental to be sure, but it provides an opportunity to introduce Buddy’s mindset and the scope and scale of his abilities which is definitely useful.
While that plays well, the real meat of the episode involves Buddy’s daughter Maxine. Being a precocious child that she is, she’s very insistent about having a puppy that she’s already named Mr. Woofers. It’s understandable why he doesn’t want to since it would interfere with his powers over the long run, but she’s nowhere near old enough to really understand. What this does bring to the forefront though is something through a dream sequence that’s more a warning than anything else where we get a black and white (and red) segment in which Buddy finds that Maxine is essentially killing off the family, or at least that’s what Cliff is warning him about. It’s a disturbing sequence that ends in an even more disturbing way that’s setting the path of the story in The Red, which is the metaphsyical world of sorts that deals with all things animal. It’s not dealt with clearly here outside of the actual story title, but those that have followed Animal Man over the years can make the connection easily. The whole sequence lays out a dark time ahead for Buddy to be sure.
Digital Notes:
This digital Comixology edition of Animal Man comes with just the original first printing cover with no extras included.
In Summary:
Animal Man has a bit of a rough first issue since it’s trying to cover a whole lot of ground for a fairly complicated character that has been buffeted around the DC Universe in many ways over the years. It covers a lot just from the first page with the interview and that’s a critical piece. Jeff Lemire has things pretty tightly done here with the script and manages to capture a good flavor when it comes to the Baker family household. The problem part is the artwork by Travel Foreman. It’s distinctive to be sure and it reminds me of a lot of Vertigo books from the 90’s that I used to read. But I simply found it too distracting in telling the story because of the angles used for the point of view and the way the characters faces look. Animal Man is a book that can pull it off to some degree since it uses some very offbeat ideas for powers and more, but it just rubbed me the wrong way here. Not enough to drop by the book by any means, but it’s going to be something of a drag on it for me.
Grade: B
