“Real Americans”
Creative Staff:
Story: Ron Marz
Art: Beni Lobel
Colors: Juancho!
Letterer: Rus Wooton
What They Say:
Husband-and-wife intelligence agents Janosh and Victorya Neumann fled Russia for their lives, winding up as assets for the United States. But when the U.S. government abandons them, Jan and Victorya are on their own as their past, in the form of a Russian operative, confronts them. With only each other to depend upon, will the couple have a future? The real-life saga reaches its finale, courtesy of acclaimed writer Ron Marz and artist Beni Lobel.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
As we’ve talked about before, “based on true stories” works are always kind of weird in being adapted as you really have to be judicious with what you include. This series has Ron Marz telling the tale and with decades of experience in writing some really great stories, he’s able to take some of the more streamlined elements of this and deliver something solidly engaging. The issues out so far have done a really solid job with what it’s doing, filling in backstory but making forward progress, all while slowly humanizing our characters. While Marco Castiello was on the artwork for the first four issues, this one has Beni Lobel stepping in with Juancho keeping the color design on track so it doesn’t feel jarring. Lobel captures some of the old-school style “spy” elements right but also handles the very humanized final aspect in a way that certainly delivers.
With Vasily having come to see Jan and Victorya, the first chunk of this finale does a decent job of trying to win them back through threats in the least subtle way possible. It’s fun to watch as Vasily tries to figure out the right approach but sticking to the tried and true all while finding that the pair really have no interest. It’s only stopped when some of the agents come in that are posing as locals doing the housewarming kind of thing and that lets Jan help them out the door. It’s a good reinforcement of how some of them really do care for the couple and what they’re going through and the way they were being watched at this point. It’s simple and easy to deal with, and puts someone new on a watchlist for the agencies with Vasily, but it closes out this part of things for the couple.
We do see some of how their life goes from here, in how the agencies basically dropped them and moved on which caused them to have to struggle a lot to figure out how to survive in a new country. It shifts more to them talking about their upcoming child, who will be American born, and shifts to Jan talking directly to the reader about the events that follow, the struggles with nearly being deported, work permits, acclimation, and so forth. The post-script does talk about how Victorya’s voice in all of this is less than his but that’s more that she intends to tell her own tale of it as well, which will be interesting to see in contrast. Showing how the pair have gone over the years and that they have found their place here definitely helps, but it again reminds just how bad we can be at times in helping people when it suits our interests and then not going the distance. But as Jan says, America is its people and its people treated them well.
In Summary:
Almost American has definitely been an interesting and engaging read overall with some fun moments along the way. Marz did a solid job of bringing the tale to life and making it something that you felt invested in throughout. It’s definitely interesting to read this final installment considering real-world events now as well. I’m not a fan of the artists changing in the final issue but this one at least takes a different turn in terms of storytelling that it makes less of an impact overall. It’s a good series in full and something that speaks to an age I grew up in with tales like this so it certainly has its appeal. It’s also a welcome change from a lot of other projects AfterShock Comics works with and I’m definitely glad they’re willing to take chances on things like this.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 15+
Released By: AfterShock Comics
Release Date: March 30th, 2022
MSRP: $3.99
