Radiant Black #39 // Review
There’s a knock on the front door of a residence in Hammond, Virginia. The gentleman answering the door is Wendell George. The gentleman asking to come-in identifies himself as Jack Marlowe. Wendell agrees to let Jack into his place. The accompanying personnel in the 5 armored trucks are going to wait outside, though. Things are getting tense in Radiant Black #39. The writing team of Kyle Higgins and Joe Clark build dramatic tension in a fun sci-fi drama that continues to find novel territory for some old superhero tropes that might have otherwise felt at least a bit tedious. The story is rendered for the page by the art team of Marcelo Costa, Giona Zefiro and Paulo Daniel Santos.
The gentleman in question wants to take a look in Wendell’s garage. There’s no sense of danger for anyone involved. Not really. Marlowe just wants to talk. Nothing more than that. Meanwhile in Chicago, tensions are getting jangled between opposing ends of a refugee drama involving displaced people from a parallel timeline. Two different heroes show-up to try to quell aggressions, but they’re not exactly going to be in a good position to de-escalate matters as they’re essentially at odds with each other. Things are about to get ugly. This isn’t just a mob scene. Super powers are involved. There’s no telling what might happen.
The ideas that Higgins and Clark are exploring are deeply provocative in quite a few different ways. They aren’t exactly framed in a way that feels all that dynamic, though. It’s easy enough to get a couple of characters into a political conversation, but it doesn’t exactly engage the visual end of the comic book medium in a way that feels terribly compelling. This is just one scene in a comic book that also happens to feature some very compelling moments and scenes that are brought to the page in a wave at feels very immersive.
The protest scene between the two groups and some of attentions between Jack and Wendell are given quite a bit of weight in an issue that is a largely appealing visually. A different locations are given subtly different atmospheres that feel engaging enough to draw-in the reader for the deeper end of the political allegory that the writers are working with. The art team firmly establishes each location with well-rendered opening panels that provide a firm anchor for the action and drama delivered in every scene of the issue.
As always, Radiant Black comes very, very close to exploring ground that’s already been mapped-out and inhabited by nearly eery other superhero story in history...but Higgins, Clark and company continue to do a very good job of presenting it all in a way that feels like it’s actually doing something bold and new. A deeper reading of the series reveals concern about power, tension and mass anxieties that feel vey much a product of their time. Higgins, Clark and company continue to find something new in old superhero tropes once more.
