Warren Ellis writes fast comics. When I read a Warren Ellis comic, I always feel as though I'm trying to keep up with him. This occasionally means that I fall behind and have a hard time keeping up with the ideas, they fly by so quickly (certain issues of Planetary come to mind). This also sometimes means that he doesn't give them the opportunity to build a solid base (Tokyo Storm Warning, for instance). Then there are books that attack quickly and with such precision, that they seem unstoppable, not even their slight flaws holding them back. The book I'm writing about today is Ocean.
This six issue series (which makes it easy to think of as a 132 page complete story), finds Ellis joined by one of the best storytellers working in comics today, Chris Sprouse. His most recent regular series being Tom Strong for Alan Moore's America's Best Comics Line, Sprouse certainly has a pedigree list of writers vying for his skills. His clean line, his comfortable character design, and his ability to bring out the natural in a supernatural situation. I tend to pass on most science fiction titles, and while Ellis was enough to get me to check this out, Sprouse was the one that led me to add it, sight unseen, to my subscription list. I had skimmed through issue one when it came out, and it looked worth continuing, so I kept holding them until I had the first five issues. For some reason, I thought there were only going to be five, so I started reading them last week.
I never understood why people will give a synopsis in a review. Why would anyone need any of that to determine whether or not they were going to read or watch something. I figure that any accurate synopsis would include some kind of spoiler, so all you will get on this site is a pitch line. Ocean's pitch idea is: U.N. Inspector In Space. What Warren Ellis does with it from that point is what's important.
Ellis lets his ideas have a little space in this series, as opposed to many issues of Transmetropolitan, which he would attack the reader with a barrage of throwaway sci-fi riffs that would either enthrall or annoy, the strength being quantity rather than quality. That series was at it's best when it dealt with the characters, and Ocean is a fine character study.
Chris Sprouse is able to subtly delineate emotions without relying too much on exposition to drive the reader's understanding of personality and motive. The subtlety was occasionally too much for me though, and I found myself inferring what a particular panel was supposed to tell me. This subtlety shouldn't stop you, however, as I tend to be a little thick to many authors hints (as evidenced by the fact that I still love reading comics at age 31). The artist's skill allows Ellis to let the story flow as a balance between words and pictures, reducing the need for constant exposition of attitude, making room for the sometimes detailed exposition of the science fiction plot points. This means that for a sci-fi interloper like myself, I don't feel bogged down by a ton of mumbo-jumbo and can get back to the point. Namely, what these characters are going to do with their current situation, motivations, and emotions.
It is possible that Ellis will throw the whole thing out the window by cocking up the finale to this series, but I expect to enjoy the final act as much as the preceding. If any of this sounds remotely interesting, track down this Wildstorm series, or at least keep an eye out for the trade paperback which is sure to follow shortly thanks to DC's aggressive collections program.
No comments:
Post a Comment