Comic Review: Peter Panzerfaust #10

            I’m not really sure how a comic that combines two of my favorite things: the reworking of classic stories (in this case Peter Pan) and anything to do with WWII, flew under my radar for so very long, but it did.  Now that I know about it, and my expectations are boosted accordingly, let’s see if it lives up to them. 

Cover:

            I assume because this story deals with the Peter Pan mythos, that the women on the cover are Tiger Lily and Wendy.  It is a fairly generic cover, just two characters against a black background, but considering that they play a pretty big part in staging a rescue in this issue, it seems fitting that they are sharing the cover.  There is no narrative quality to the cover at all but it does paint them as strong women that are not going to be the “damsel in distress” type during this story. 

            The illustration itself is heavily inked but does a good job of differentiating between the different textures of skin and cloth and adding just enough detail to make it realistic but not oversaturating it. The best part is that artist Tyler Jenkins makes sure that each woman is not a carbon copy of the other.  They are obviously different ethnicities, but they are also dressed differently and are even holding different pistols, with Wendy holding one that appears to be more German in make as opposed to Lily’s traditional one.  Jenkins obviously put a lot of thought into not only the initial character design, but also the design of the cover itself instead of just slapping a couple characters onto a cover.

            The best part of this cover is the logo though.  Between the red color with the white outlines and the silhouette of the tank, it just works wonderfully as not only a stand-alone logo, but also as a logo on the comic itself.  It draws attention to the book with the color choice and definitely conveys a sense of what the book is about.  It almost has an old-school feel to me, like it belongs in the 1940s or something like that.  I’m not sure why, but I look at that and immediately it puts me in the right mindset to read this book.

8/10 – It’s not going to win any “cover of the year” votes, but it is very effective.

Story:

             There was no recap page in the front, so I was honestly a little lost when I started.  Writer Kurtis Wiebe does a decent job of creating a sullen mood like you would find during this time in history (and the art helps that along exponentially, but I’ll get to that in a bit) but the setup is lost.  Where are they exactly?  I see that there are soldiers around, but are they in a concentration camp or are they a ghetto, like the Jewish one set up in Warsaw?  It’s pretty unclear and isn’t helped by the lack of backgrounds.  All I can tell is that they are all on the roof of some building, which is probably only being used as a plot device so that Wiebe can introduce the wooden plank that the prisoners (if that’s what they are) will have to walk out to before getting shot.

This plank.

While I don’t really understand all of what is going on, the imagery that Wiebe paints in terms of the setting relating to the pirate ship in the initial Pan story is awesome.  This is why I like retellings so much, for those little Easter Eggs that a smart writer will throw in to help you make the correlation.  It’s one thing to have characters by with the same names as their classic counterparts, it’s another thing entirely to conjure up familiar imagery in unfamiliar situations, which Wiebe does exceptionally here. 

            This is my first foray into the world of Peter Panzerfaust, do all of the issues wind up shooting us into the future, post-war?  While I like that this is being relayed to someone else, as if they were conducting an interview in order to write a book or article, it does take a little of the suspense out of the story.  While we don’t expect Peter or Tiger Lily, or anyone for that matter, to actually die because they don’t in the original story, knowing that these individuals make it out alive does remove the stakes here somewhat.  It’s not a major gripe because, really, who doesn’t want a happy ending, but it would be nice to have some speculation as to who of the main characters would make it out of the war alive. 

7/10 – It’s a bit confusing with the amount of characters that get thrown at you, and the fact that a setting is not really established bother me a bit.  However, the way that Wiebe intertwines the story for his characters with bits and pieces of the original Peter Pan makes for an interesting and entertaining read.

Art:

            This is the kind of art that I like.  Cartoony but still grounded in realism.  I know there are many of you out there that want to see Bryan Hitch type realism in every panel, and that is a fight that we can have at a different time, just know that the art here fits the time period and tone of the story perfectly. 

            As much as I enjoy the lineart, I have to admit that the best part about the art in this book is the coloring by Heather Breckel.  She does a great job of creating a mood in each different “act” of this issue.  She lets the heavy inks do their thing but isn’t afraid to punctuate the tone with her own skill set.  As cartoony as the art is, she makes it feel real.  If Jenkins had drawn this with stick figures I guarantee that it would have a similar feel based on the way she colors.  Great job.

            Now, on to some not so great observations.  Do you remember how I mentioned that the cover was well done in part because of the way that Jenkins differentiated the two women?  It doesn’t happen so much with the men in the interiors.  Aside from Peter’s big swooping hairstyle, all of the men look a little too similar to make much of a distinction.  The only one that really stood out aside from Peter was Julien, because of his afro.  If you remove the hairstyles, all of the men look essentially the same. 

            The lack of backgrounds here is pretty ridiculous.  I understand not putting a detailed background in every panel of every page, but at times it looks like Jenkins is basically putting lines in for rain and deciding that that will be his background.  Like I said earlier, that does very little to help establishing a setting. 

A whole page where the only background is rain.  I would think they are in Britain, but how would I know?

5/10 – There are some really good parts of the art in this issue (the coloring being number one), but the overall confusing nature of the art doesn’t assist a script that doesn’t do much establishing work itself. 

Overall:  6/10 – This is a great concept with okay execution that may be falling into the “writing for the trade” trap.  I could easily see this as a chapter in a graphic novel or a trade paperback, not so much as a stand alone issue.