T Bird and Throttle #1

 

There's a lot of bandied words about "deconstruction' these days. "These aren't archetypes, they're people!" screams one camp.... as then Spider-Man sells his marriage to the Devil. Wait, back that up. That's a cartoonish thing to have Peter Parker do, right? Somehow people just sell their marriages? To the Devil? That's a thing? I've seen a lot of weird shit in my life, but I've never heard of that one. "They're supposed to be inspiring" screams the other camp, and hold up figures who they were confused about what that character was actually inspiring in the first place. I've put a lot of keystrokes towards the most egregious example of that hypocrisy on this blog.

So what happens when someone manages to do the virtuous thing and find the middle ground?

Ooh, that's a chef's kiss. 

Enter T Bird, a superhero who has washed out. He hit hard times, and while he didn't give up he certainly faded. He's also powerless, which doesn't help. When the corporation who had formerly backed T Bird gives him a chance to redeem himself, he finds he has no choice but to go with this chance. Even if it's probably a lie.

Josh Howard mans the whole show here. And it is a cohesive job. This is what happens when you get a good writer/artist on a comic: you can't tell that either of the jobs was prioritized, and it happens to feel more coherent than two people working together. Howard puts it together really well, treating each part of the job with equal care. It's nice to see someone take the craft as a whole so seriously.

Now, what makes this story the golden mean is the absolute dedication of Howard to showing T Bird's strengths and weaknesses, equally. Mitch has a fantastic sense of duty... and is a terrible husband. He knows he's a terrible husband. He tries to not be. He fails. He's good at being a hero, but only if he's got powers, and only if he's got his family. And the first issue is about how he accidentally damages it almost beyond compare. It's a fantastically put together beginning.

It's not too often that I find something that gets how to legitimately treat heroes. None of the characters in this book are pathetic, but none of them feel like they belong in a preschooler's coloring book. The production is top-notch. And I felt like I was having a ton of fun the whole time. You don't usually get fun and introspection, so that's something.