Broken Frontier

An old threat rises anew and an old hero must put on a new face… more than one.

When Moonstone Books managed to get the right to resurrect the Captain Action character, they quickly tapped veteran writer Fabian Nicieza for the job. While Captain Action may have begun as a toy in the 1960’s, it quickly made the leap into a comic book existence. Over the years there have been many Captain Action series produced by many different comic book companies. Do Moonstone and Nicieza have what it takes to make this one a hit?

The invasion almost went unnoticed. Alien parasites were discovered in the blood of those in positions of power starting in the 1960’s. A secret organization was developed along with a secret hero to combat this hidden menace. Eventually, it looked like the day was won but the truth was far different. The aliens were playing a long game, they could afford to wait. Now a new secret hero must emerge to set things right… but does he have what it takes?

I will give Moonstone this, as a zero issue this one works quite well. Fifteen pages of material serve to introduce most of the main characters from the comic, set up the adventure, and give some idea of the tone of the comic. Unfortunately Nicieza chose to do this in one of the most clichéd ways possible – narration caption boxes. Even worse, the narrator Nicieza uses is one who really cannot be narrating thanks to events in the story. What is more, some old fans of Captain Action may end up disappointed as Nicieza goes out of his way to emphasize that the new Captain Action is definitely "not your father’s Captain Action." The introduction is shocking but feels like a deliberate attempt to shock – an action taken only to cut with the past rather than being an organic flow of characterization. However, I supposed this can be forgiven since the comic only has limited space to perform this action in.

The art by Mark Sparacio is another double edged sword. While his work is certainly very polished and contains a slick kind of realism, it is also very stiff. Sequences do not flow one into the next and the physical action pieces are static rather than giving a true feeling of momentum and dynamism. There is also something slightly off about the poses and proportions of some figures in a few panels. It is subtle but still detectible.

Only time will tell how older fans may receive this new take on an old hero. As for new fans… admittedly, there is a good hook here and that hook still shines through despite some clunky plot devices. It may be enough to lure in the curious. While the issue accomplishes what most zero issues are designed to do you can still hear grinding in the gears here. Hopefully by the time the first issue hits, the story will be moving like a well-oiled machine.