Posted in: Comics, Review | Tagged: Comics, comics review, dan didio, dc comics, entertainment, Infinity Man and the Forever People, jack kirby, keith giffen

Homage And Evolution In Infinity Man And The Forever People

By Christopher Helton

Dan Didio gets a lot of grief over the management side of his work at DC Comics, but I have enjoyed his comic writing work at the company, particularly the OMAC reboot that he did with artist and collaborator Keith Giffen. This team is back and tackling another Jack Kirby creation: The Forever People.

Even though I trade-waited for the OMAC book, I really enjoyed the story that the two of them told in the comic. Their love for Kirby's original work shown through in the book, and this is happening again in the first issue of Infinity Man and the Forever People. My only real complaint about the book is that there was no Infinity Man in this issue. Admittedly, they had a lot of work setting up the cast that we have, so this could be forgiven but with the character's name on the cover it would have been nice to have at least seen a nod to him at some point in the issue.

Gone is Serafin, the cosmic cowboy of the original comic, replaced by Serafina, sister to Vykin, part of the Elite Youth of High Father. Also gone is the embarrassing need to call the character "Vykin the Black" any longer. Most of the other adjustments to the characters for the new world seem to be minor. The bickering quality that the characters had in the original Forever People comics is still there. Dreamer Beautiful (I'm not sure why they felt the need to flip the parts of her name around, to be honest) seems a bit more vague than her original counterpart, living more up to the dreamer part of her name.

These Forever People are sent to Earth with a mission, to help with the advancement of humanity (presumably to help out the New Gods in their conflict with Darkseid). One benefit of creating a new universe is that the New Gods get to be a backbone of it, rather than a concept introduced that then has to be backdated into all of the stories. Orion has been a part of the story in Wonder Woman. Darkseid was the impetus for the creation of the team in the Justice League. The world of Earth 2 has been forever scarred by war with an Apokolips of its alternate universe. This was also hinted at in Didio and Giffen's previous OMAC as well, although cancellation didn't allow the development of that story.

I don't like to judge the success or failure of a comic's story on a single issue. I know, this makes me a bad comic geek. My judgment of a first issue is this: do I want to pick up the next issue? Definitely yes. There is nothing is the revealed changes so far that make me want to ragequit before the first issue. In fact I find the characterizations (so far) to be deft, and each character has their own, unique voice. The characters have a mystery to them that makes me want to find out more about them. Big Bear and Dreamer Beautiful, in particular seem so far to have some depth to them that wasn't previously there. I'm looking forward to seeing more of the two of them.

The "Hey, let's put a bunch of strange people into Venice, California because no one will notice more strange people there…amirite?" element to the plot, while probably true, did seem a bit clichéd. Although I guess that it is better than reestablishing the Forever People as a group of hipsters living in Brooklyn. However, after the reveal of the villain at the end of the issue (one of my favorites of Kirby's Fourth World characters) I am willing to give them a little slack on the Venice subplot. Even the nod to Kirby in the story isn't so cute that it takes away from the story.

Giffen brings his A game with the art, in his full on Kirby mode. I have been a fan of this looser style of art from Giffen since he started using it way back in the Legion of Super-Heroes days. It fit well with the tone of his and Didio's work on OMAC and it fits well with Infinity Man and the Forever People. His character designs update the looks of the characters but still keep them recognizable as a new take on the classic characters.

I am definitely interested in this book, both as an homage to the work of Kirby and as an evolution of them for a new audience. The books of DC Comics' New 52 have been hit or miss for me, but I would like to see this end up in the hit category. It is a quirky, character-driven issue, and that is something that I would like to see more of from DC Comics. I would like to see this get a longer run than Didio and Giffen's OMAC, and I would definitely like to see this get a longer run than Kirby's original book. The Forever People is one of Kirby's concepts that is adaptable to new generations and new stories, and this first issue shows that.

However, I will demand right now that Deadman appear in the book.

Christopher Helton is a blogger, podcaster and tabletop RPG publisher who talks about games and other forms of geekery at the long-running Dorkland! blog. He is also the co-publisher at the ENnie Award winning Battlefield Press, Inc.  You can find him on Twitter at @dorkland and on G+ at https://plus.google.com/+ChristopherHelton/ where he will talk your ear off about gaming and comics.

Christopher has a crowdfunding page to help raise money to defray the costs for going to the Gen Con gaming convention and cover it for his Dorkland! blog and Bleeding Cool. Please click here to go to the page and help out.

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