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I'm a big Surfer fan. From the references to the comic in 'Breathless' where comics were first shown to my little eyes as being 'cool' to the relaunch by Marshall Rogers. The Ron Lim run as well. Then I got all Silver Age, etc. So I like the character and I know him a fair bit.
This new series, seemingly part of Marvel's 'Let's do ____ without ___' line (just put Daredevil, Hulk, what have you in the blanks) caused eye rolls galore.
A friend dropped them off and I immediately anticipated the nervous return to him where I said nothing or just shrugged, citing some other story as being better. I read all five issues in one sitting last night and was terribly impressed.
It's very uneven. I don't think Marvel knew what they were doing putting this out. The art in issue one is quite terrible, the coloring dodgy, the story... where's the Silver Surfer??? BUT... it pays off big time.
The story is essentially told from the POV of a mother who is down on her luck, turning her back on the vodoun (sp?) religion of her mother to read palms in New Orleans tourist spots for easy money. Her child is believed to be autistic and will only draw pictures of a Surfer-like character in crayon. Then the child is abducted by said Surfer. No one believes the mother's story and she gets doped up in the hospital until she gets free and finds that she's not alone. Lots of gifted children are getting taken away under similar circumstances and with similar clues to her own(bright light, silver man, burn marks).
This is all told through very moving writing that will be missed by most people who see the Surfer on a comic and are like 'Cool, I love the Surfer.' No fault to them. It's bad marketing.
Eventually this rich business man contacrs her as his son, a gifted pianist, was abducted by the Surfer and he thinks she can help him find his kid. So they find a connection in Wales where a woman claims her kid was taken by aliens. On the way they stop off at Portmeiron (no shit!) and a few Prisoner references are made.
This goes on and on but eventually we get to see the Surfer with the kids and these other grey-type aliens. Around issue 5 the premise for the series is revealed and it's very poetic. Humanity, through its warfare and barbaric ways is dying out and its pain is felt in the cosmos. Surfer is trying to help by super evolving the children so that they can return to Earth and change things for the better (I'm not retelling it well, flip through #5 for the real deal).
In any case, you need to read the first five in one sitting (which is not a good thing), but it IS a suprisingly good read from my perspective and I walked in hating it. A great reduced bin buy, but I'm very sad that this series will not find its audience and that I've heard so little said about on these boards as I think it would appeal to the avid 'Lither. |
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