Broken Frontier

Action and espionage comics have the tough task of balancing the real and fantastical elements in a believable manner. Many times they need to establish themselves in our world without over politicizing, but still making a story that seems to matter. It’s this juggle that can make or break the book.

In IDW’s new foray into licensed properties, The A-Team: Shotgun Wedding, the writers work from a new status quo, one that will seemingly be established in this summer’s upcoming film. The likenesses are those of the film’s actors and one of the co-plotters is the film’s director. All ingredients intriguing enough on their own, together they would hopefully yield a fun but real story. Not unlike IDW’s amazing G.I. Joe: Cobra book.

With Cobra, they took an established property and infused it with real smart and well-written stories, not reliant on gimmicks or flash. With a film that’s almost five months away, this issue might give us a sneak peek of the movie’s tone and mission. What kind of angle they might take to entertain and endear us new viewers to the already established brand name, The A-Team.

They missed the mark with this reader.

Starting out in genre fashion, we’re treated to text boxes of exposition, explaining the location and set up for our heroes’ mission. We are then introduced to Colonel John “Hannibal” Smith and Corporal Bosco “B.A.” Baracus. Both men are former Army Rangers and now members of a Special Forces Unit with operational detachment from the government, codenamed A-Team.

The men are knee deep in a recon mission, with patience wearing thin due to the weather. They are reliant on their other teammates to pick them up before the whole mission goes belly up. The details of the mission are inconsequential and considering how much time the writers spent on them, it’s regrettable that the mission didn’t stand out just a little.

The main problem comes from the issue’s at times cheesy tone and some unfortunately clichéd chunks of dialogue. These characters come off as stereotypes of an old television show (which they admittedly are) and far less like actual people. Hannibal chomps on a cigar, B.A. complains, and Face is a horn dog (more on that later). Murdock is the only one that doesn’t get an eye winking character moment.

The art chores by Steve Mooney are well done and fluent in the action scenes. There was no point where I was lost in any of the plot’s forward motion, which isn’t to say that anything happened. This is the second issue of Mooney’s I’ve read. He had art chores on the ill-conceived Angel Annual last year, and this is the second time where his art was the creative process' better half.

The biggest thing that took me out of this issue was a joke that fell flat, with a loud thud, regarding Face’s lady killing ways and the inclusion of a certain former Alaskan governor. Yeah, he hits on Sarah Palin. This whole attempt at humor is shoehorned into the proceedings so sloppily that it transforms this issue from a rocky start with potential to a silly misfire on trying to be topical and tongue in cheek. This one page gag with a weak, later referenced punch line really does sully the whole affair.

Nostalgia is a great thing and can be a strong selling factor when reaching a wider comic book audience. Regrettably, it can also be a crutch, sullied with referential inside jokes and silly coincidences, disregarding modern audiences' sensibilities. If you want to reach a large audience, why would you alienate them? It’s hard to look to the past when the first five pages of this book tried so hard to establish the events in a real and dangerous world.

Tonally, this issue is all over the place. If this is the direction they plan to take this property, in the movie as well as its tie-ins, I am sorely disappointed in what could have been one heck of a fun time.

Fingers crossed for the future.