At the minute I seem to have a thing
for the comic book writer Brian Michael Bendis. I have just finished “Avengers:
Dissemble” (review soonish) which made me realise he was one of three people to
create my favourite line of Marvel comics, the “ultimate universe”. Plus most of
the big titles I have coming through “The Ultimate Graphic Novel Collection”
are written by him. It was a little bit of a surprise when I realised that
“Powers”, a series I discovered through my favourite app Comixology, was also
written by Bendis and that it is one of the best ideas I have read for a while.
The only other time I have come across a story like this was the marvel story
“Marvels”, a tale that follows the life of a photographer who lived through
some of the greatest stories in the history of Marvel. “Powers” follows
homicide detective Christian Walker and his newly appointed partner, Deena
Pilgrim, as they solve crimes involving people with super powers.
The first story arc, “Who Killed
Retro Girl?” follows the detectives coming together for the first time and the
two of them trying to solve the mystery of Retro Girl’s death. From the word go
the story is very welcoming and quick paced, but the panels are not minimal
making each page full of great visuals. Not like some comics, “Powers” packs so
much into the page allowing in some ways a lot more to happen. The art work by
Michael Avon Oeming is very stunning on every page. The blocky and colourful
images are so bold and stand up on the page making it very memorable; it is
exciting to see action scenes and even just a conversation between 2 characters
becomes even more potent through the images.
The story itself was not just entertaining but sometimes I did not want it to end or couldn’t see an ending coming, even though I had only one issue left to read. Both the main characters play off each other well and even though the way they meet and are asked to work together is very stereotypical it worked so well and felt pretty fresh. Added subplots as in the little girl Christian is told to look after and the fact that Christian is linked to the Superheroes in some way, create great depth to an already interesting main plot structure.
Overall I loved this comic and was
glad to grab the first 2 (second still to read) story arcs cheap through
Comixology, a website I would tell any new comic book fan to check out!!
