Broken Frontier

The seeds of Brandon Cayce’s uneventful life make for an extraordinary death in Vertigo’s re-imagining of one of DC’s most enigmatic characters—Deadman.

The mysteries of death aren’t that different from the mysteries of life. But if the world’s religions can’t solve them, maybe string-theory, parapsychology, and political conspiracy can help a cocky pilot who likes partying as much as flying. It all comes crashing down—literally—when Brandon’s brother Scott deliberately crashes the 747 they’re piloting into downtown London. Everyone on board, including Brandon, is killed. But death is Brandon’s new beginning. With new mysteries to unravel and a new situation to accept, the only person with the answers Brandon needs may be Sarah, his late brother’s wife, whom Brandon once loved, and still does.

Vertigo isn’t Vertigo without a mature sensibility, muscular story-telling, and more risk-taking than a hedge fund. At least that’s the way it used to be. These days one can’t help but wonder if there’s a different culture or sensibility at DC’s imprint, one that greenlights weak concepts like American Virgin and de-emphasizes the importance of first issues. Of the spate of recent #1’s, only two—the first issues of DMZ and Exterminators—have been so solidly executed and entertaining that I didn’t need subsequent installments to decide whether I’d keep reading. But more importantly, and unlike Testament, I didn’t need more issues to get a handle on the core concepts of either. So how does Deadman #1 stack up against the others in Vertigo’s ‘05-’06 class of first issues? It’s not clear, and that’s part of the problem.

From the first page it’s clear that this title has high aspirations. Quoting Einstein is one thing, but you don’t quote Ludwig Wittgenstein without a fair amount of intellectual cojones and a big picture in mind. However, just what that big picture is remains a mystery throughout and isn’t well developed, or even well-hinted at by the end of the issue. Certainly the broad strokes are there. Jones touches on super-string theory, the possibility of life after death on the earthly plane without being a zombie, the laws that govern the supernatural portion of whatever it is we call reality, and the hazy contours of what will surely be a very strange conspiracy. But while each of these elements is interesting on its own, one might think that with no obvious or natural connections among them the reader shouldn’t have to assume that there’s some grand narrative that ties them together. Rather, it should be imperative that the writer at least dramatizes it, however enigmatically, however cryptically with the sense that nothing is as it seems. That Jones doesn’t do this makes Deadman #1 a disappointment, and I finished it with a nagging feeling that Jones may not have a firm grip on what he’s trying to do.

Despite this, the technique is there—for the most part. Jones is far from a slouch as a writer and has a natural feel for pacing, dialogue, and rising action. In particular, Brandon and Scott communicating in death as they apparently never did in life is an intriguing angle, and the way that Jones characterizes them through their interactions and Brandon’s memories is well done. This reader just wishes there were more, as this is the meatiest, most compelling aspect of Deadman #1. But when Jones takes the focus away from the brothers and, for instance, and shifts to a tediously extended scene depicting a plane’s crash landing, he leaves himself little room for the characterization needed to make the reader connect with Brandon. Sarah could be a very interesting character, as well, but we know too little about her, least of all why Brandon is still in love with the woman who left him for his own brother. Structured a little differently, with a greater emphasis on character interaction—if the big picture isn’t going to be laid out for us—Deadman #1 could have been a much more substantial debut.

Though limited by Jones’ problematic script, the art of John Watkiss is still solid. As in Trigger, he lays down a noir sci-fi style with hard black lines that integrate well with Jeremy Cox’s soft-focused tints and hues. The effect is a wonderful sense of depth and texture, even if it would have had more impact had Jones taken greater advantage of his art team’s skills. Still, making do with what he’s given, Watkiss adds extra layers of characterization in sequences where Brandon and Scott trade emotional reactions, and the way he plays with angles and unorthodox framing keeps the reader engaged in the story while conveying Brandon’s sense of disorientation as he hovers between this and the afterlife. And as for character design, while I wish we could have seen more of his smartly gorgeous Sarah, Watkiss’ pale rock-star take on the "new" Brandon is just what the character needs in the 21st century. One of the reasons why I’m hoping that the rest of Deadman is better than this first issue is that I want to see more artwork like this.

It’s hard to say where Deadman is going, but it’s easy to say that great art but so-so writing is precisely what Vertigo’s new take on an old character doesn’t need.