The high of control and lack of control.
Creative Staff:
Story: Zack Kaplan
Art: John J. Pearson
Letterer: Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou
What They Say:
After awkward dreamer Ben Sharp accidentally stumbles upon a real-life mind control signal, he and his friends set out to experiment on its mechanics and test its limits. But as they flirt with absolute control and invade Silicon Valley’s glitziest parties, they’re forced to ask just how far each will go with their newfound power?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Delving into any new Zack Kaplan work has me in that weird space of being really keen to see what they have in store but also kind of worried because it’ll delve into some areas that scratch the parts of my mind I try to avoid. Kaplan has an interesting work here that delves into a lot of modern problems but with a fun twist of mind control of sorts. With this project, he’s paired up with John J. Pearson for the artwork and color design and that delivers a really interesting look. Since this is very much a dialogue-driven piece here, especially in the first issue, without much in the way of action, Pearson is able to make it engaging with the layouts and designs of the characters so that you’re going with the flow of the narrative and dialogue as it unfolds. It definitely delivers a really good experience.
With a lot of things in the present explored the last time around to set up the framing, the bulk of it moved into the past and the discovery of the signal that allows for control. The initial discovery was intriguing and seeing how they attempt to use it here, to understand it, is a mix of trial and error in figuring out time and kind of control and then just absurdity in what they make each other do. But it serves to gives them some guidelines in understanding how they can control others. The problem is that for most of these guys, they’re not big outgoing types and are just thinking of what can be done. But Eitan, who has quite a history as we learned before and now expanded upon even more here with his backstory and upbringing, is intent on doing something much bigger with this.
Of course, the first real thing is just hitting up some parties to see what they can get away with using the ability and that leads to something bigger with a VC party, one that has Peter at it even if they don’t come across him. It’s where we get to see Ben meeting Hanna for the first time and the way they clicked there and it gives us a chance to understand Ben more. But it is also what leads to him, as time goes on, to figure out the best use of what they’ve discovered. It may seem weird to create an app from what they learned but the path is one that makes sense contextually, as they come up for rules on how it should be used among them and the way they push the boundaries for things. You know things will circle around over time to where we are in the present and how the difficulties will connect, but seeing this weird optimism with them holding in their hands something that would radically alter mankind is fascinating.
In Summary:
Mindset continues to be an intriguing project that, at times, feels like it’s something that’s easily adaptable into another medium. I don’t believe Kaplan designed in that way but it’s something that you can see being done in a way that would be really engaging because what he and Pearson have put together here works really well. This isn’t the kind of series that you flip through and just “get” everything because it’s written simply. It’s not overly complex either, but it’s one that requires you to go through all of its details and dialogue to know what it wants to convey and hint at what’s to come. I’m becoming more excited to see where it goes and what kind of twists there are ahead.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 16+
Released By: Vault Comics
Release Date: August 10th, 2022
MSRP: $4.99
