Comic Review: Boneyard #1

                No, we are not travelling back in time to 2001 today.  That was when the original Boneyard #1 premiered from NBM Publishing.  This one, from Antarctic Press, picks up where that original series ended (for the most part), with all of the same characters and the same humor that made that original series pretty damn perfect.  Will this one live up to its predecessor?  Let’s find out.

Cover:

                It’s a Richard Moore comic book, so there’s a great chance that there will be a scantily clad woman on the cover.  This one doesn’t disappoint as Abbey, one of the main protagonists of the book is shown in an actual scene from the story, trying to keep her dress from flying up over her head while she is fighting a monster.  The expression that Moore has placed on Abbey says a lot about the character herself (and Moore has always been a master of conveying emotion through facial expressions) in that she is obviously fed up with having to play the heroine when all she obviously wants to do is enjoy a nice dinner.

                While the expression is well done, the pose, while accurate, seems a bit wooden and stiff.  If it wasn’t for the fact that Moore tilted Abbey a bit on the page itself, she would be incredibly distracting.  When Moore paints his own work, he usually tends to follow a very monochromatic palette.  Unfortunately here it is not as effective as in the past.  While Abbey tends to pop based solely on the amount of black utilized in her overall design, the rest of the cover tends to wash out.  There is little variation in the color scheme used here, so it is more difficult to discern the different parts of the monster behind her.  Everything is a greenish-purple blob for the most part (especially since most of the monster is off the page anyway, so we can’t really see anything too clearly or make much of an educated guess as to what is what on the monster).

6/10 – Not Moore’s best cover, but it hits on all of the bases.  If know that showing Abbey was the most important thing, but he sacrificed clarity in order to do so.  A little more of a varied palette in terms of the coloring might have helped as well.

Story:

                I have waited quite a while (since the original series ended in 2009) for the return of these characters.  This was probably my first favorite comic book after I got out of the whole “superhero phase” from high school.  I found this series when it was still pretty much in its infancy so I was able to watch it grow and wait on each quarterly installment with baited breath (I was a super nerd) and this was the only comic book that I actively kept up on after I stopped buying comics altogether a few years ago.  There was anticipation as well as a little trepidation when I picked this up.  Would this be as good as the past issues?  Would Moore be able to pick up where he left off in terms of the tone of the book after such an extended layoff?  Was he a good enough writer to keep the “voice” of the series even after such a rough breakup with the original publisher, which must have left him a little bitter at the very least?

                Then I read it.  Everything was as it should be.  The writing was just as good as I remember it from the original series.  The humor and the heart is still there and even though the romantic tension that was a highlight of the original series (that whole will they-won’t they dynamic that Moore expertly crafted) was gone because of the pairing of the two main characters at the end of the original series, Moore still was able to take that transition to a different level, focusing on their problems as a couple (and one in which one of the participants is a vampire with an age of many thousands of years).  This makes for the main push of the story as Michael (the non-vampire) is trying to live up to the reputation of the many boyfriends that his girlfriend Abbey (the vampire) has had in her loooooong lifetime.  Hilarity ensues. 

                While the plot of anything that Richard Moore creates is always well done, I find that the way he handles the in-story interactions, and the smaller jokes to be where he really shines.  Something as simple as a conversation between Michael and Abbey could seem clunky and unrealistic in less adept hands.  The part where Abbey admits that on their date she wore her “fuck-me boots” and yet any time the word “fuck” is uttered a small bat flies over it obscuring the word.  While it’s not necessary (Moore has never shied away from more adult interactions both verbally and visually) having that bat obscure the word fuck just adds to the humor level of the comic, something you rarely find nowadays.  Every once in a while, something like that is a welcome diversion, and the fact that the joke rears its head at the end of the comic is perfect.

                The only thing that I could have asked for is the inclusion of more of the supporting characters.   They are what really filled out the original series and made it memorable.  I realize that it would have been difficult to add everyone in, given the fact that it is only a standard sized comic book, but hopefully we can see what everyone else is up to in the near future.  That being said, as thin as Macabre was last month content-wise, Boneyard is bursting at the seams.  It feels as complete of a comic as I have read in quite some time. 

9/10 – There’s a reason that I pick up everything Richard Moore puts his hands on, and this issue of Boneyard is a microcosm of that.

Art:

                Moore changed his style up a bit.  Okay, let me clarify that.  If you’ve been following Moore for over five or six years you will notice that he has gone from a straight pen and ink/black and white style to more of an inkwash-heavy art style.  I’m more of a fan of his earlier work in that respect, but his inkwash work is just as good, and the fact that he tends to combine the two here on Boneyard has made it even more palatable.  I think the reason that I liked his artwork in the past so much was just how clean it was.  Every line had a place and a purpose, much like Doug Baron’s work on Jump Back Adventures (which, if you’ve never seen it before, you need to check out, Doug is a good friend and a phenomenal cartoonist). 

                Even after the long layoff between the end of the original series and the start of this one, Moore has kept all of the characters on model, just with the addition of inkwash.  The backgrounds are both complete and ever-present in practically all of the panels, perfectly rendered and providing the mood along with the setting for the story.  The monster in the story looks like a fairly typical Richard Moore monster.  It is well crafted and looks both humorous and menacing at the same time. 

9/10 – I am glad Moore is able to just do his work without having to adhere to a Marvel or DC deadline or editorial demand.  That being said, my only complaint about Richard Moore is that there isn’t more of his work.

Overall:  8/10 – Hopefully we get more of these Boneyard books in the future as this has reclaimed its rightful place on the top of my “favorite comics” list.