Broken Frontier

I haven’t picked up a Spawn comic since its centennial climax. So how does the series weigh in after over fifty issues, four years, and a new creative team past?

The nice thing about picking up a comic series cold turkey after a long personal hiatus is that one can answer candidly the age-old medium dilemma: is it accessible to new readers? (Which in this case, would most emphatically be me.)

Yuppers! The issue opens with a brief yet dramatically effective rooftop scene wherein all the current major players discuss the crucial plot points of what has come before, and after this epigrammatic little vignette the rest of the issue flows seamlessly. For anyone who hasn’t mired themselves in online comic book news (which would be all the folks not reading this, but still, worth mentioning…), there is a mention of The Man of Miracles, which will be a bit bewildering to anyone who doesn’t know of or hasn’t read the Image 10th Anniversary Hardcover (or doesn’t know of the long and winding road of the MM legal battle). Thankfully, at the very end of the issue there’s a "Twitch Journal Entry" wherein the matchstick detective jots down what amounts to being a synopsis of past issues and a quick musing of suspicious key elements (as any detective worth his salt would do). This includes a few theories on who "The Man of Miracles" might be – and this trickle of knowledge serves to clear up whatever lingering questions the issue’s actual script fails to acknowledge. So: accessibility – check!

Next up, new writer David Hine has brought to the table a story at long last worthy of the epic qualities of Spawn’s origins and nature. I admit to admiring the intent of earlier Spawn issues to present Al Simmons as a boogeyman of sorts, as a wayward demon general who refused to acknowledge his destined place in the great war of heaven and hell and who then, by default, became a dangerously unbalanced force upon the physical plane. Even the plot twist of making him the Earth’s chosen champion (a sort of Swamp Thing riff) was an interesting choice – basically, anything that avoided Simmons from becoming a cliché, antichrist-like catalyst for all of Armageddon was used and abused until, 100 issues later, the dodging of the destiny bullet had worn obnoxiously thin. I ended my collection of the series following the most epic moment to that then date (the killing of Spawn’s arch-nemesis Malebolgia) – a necessary move to make, it seemed, before more aimless, wanderlust plotting began.

Now, however, as was promised by McFarlane when Hine was first brought on board (and which I subsequently didn’t believe a word of), the story has indeed entered Armageddon territory, with Spawn the key to everything. Within this very issue he admits to accepting his role as a third supreme power within the everlasting two-sided conflict between the heavenly and infernal realms. There are some honestly breathtaking moments within the current issue, including new concepts, new characters, new stakes, and it all seems to be heading towards a grand conflagration that should in time be the payoff for anyone who’s ever followed the series. So, story by Hine: it’s the plot we’ve all been waiting for – check!

Next up is Philip Tan’s artwork. I loved Greg Capullo, and to this very day believe him to be one of the greatest artists working within the comic book field. Equally, I feel that Angel Medina truly left his mark on the book, becoming a more than worthy successor during the course of his run from issues #101-149 (hey, I still skimmed). I’ve enjoyed Tan’s earlier American work such as Mutant Earth and Taleweaver though the art he completed for Marvel in Uncanny X-men and Iron Man left (I felt) a lot to be desired, especially as directly compared with the intricacy of the miniseries that were released prior to. Was it the monthly grind that detracted from his final product? Or increased editorial interference? Could Tan support a major monthly series without suffering? Well, he certainly can now, if Spawn #154 is any indication. Five issues into his monthly run (with the title honestly coming out at a monthly pace for the first time in half a decade) and Tan’s linework is more beaucoup beautiful than ever before. Though, as it does befit Spawn’s subject matter, perhaps beautiful is a misnomer – Tan’s art in Spawn is gloriously sinister, violent, and yielding to the dark surreality of Hell literally walking the hallowed ground of Earth. So, Philip Tan as artist: the best he’s done yet, and the man has done some seriously jaw-dropping work – double check!

All around, I have to say this is the best Spawn has been since its inception, and when I say "since" I mean "including." The story is barreling toward a payoff that anyone who’s ever so much as committed to a single issue has been waiting for (they’ve mentioned Simmons’ destiny in every issue, though then proceeded to do zippo zero zilch with it – until now). Philip Tan, one of the moodiest artists in the biz (and that’s the work I’m talking about, not the man) is working at the so-far height of his career, and the book is coming out on time. If you haven’t read this series for a while, or if you’ve never been sure as to whether it was worth your time and money, now is the moment to come back to the fold, because now at lengthily long last it is a time that all fans – even would-be ones – won’t be disappointed.