A review by trike
Astro City, Vol. 16: Broken Melody by Alex Ross, Kurt Busiek, Brent Anderson
3.0
This one started off in a hole for me, because of all the Astro City characters — of which there hundreds — the Broken Man is my least favorite. Mostly that’s down to the breaking of the fourth wall, something that I absolutely loathe in comics. Hot tip, creators: it never works. Never. No one is good enough to pull it off.
(Don’t tell me about your favorite example. I’ve read it. I hated it, too. Yes, that includes Deadpool.)
So imagine my surprise to discover that I mostly liked this edition despite Brokie being the feature. We get to finally see the origins of The Astro-Naut, for whom Astro City was named, and The Gentleman, who was always a weird duck, even for this place. Plus, we get to see the over-arching threat that’s been lurking out in the cosmos all these decades. Only slightly disappointed it’s a Cthulhu-type beastie, but it does have nice echoes with the late great MMO City of Heroes.
As always, Busiek, Ross and Anderson have been playing the long game, because a lot of the stuff revealed here was already present back in the day. For instance, The Gentleman’s first appearance had a hint as to his origin, only just now revealed, more than two decades later.
So all in all it far surpassed what I was dreading. I suspect BM will be the star of the next edition, too, since s/he seems to be entangled with the ultimate big bad. But one of the few tropes Astro City hasn’t yet taken on is the world-shattering mega crossover. I hope it’s as big and twisty as the Silver Agent’s story was.
Edit: fixed typos. I had cataracts when I originally wrote this.
(Don’t tell me about your favorite example. I’ve read it. I hated it, too. Yes, that includes Deadpool.)
So imagine my surprise to discover that I mostly liked this edition despite Brokie being the feature. We get to finally see the origins of The Astro-Naut, for whom Astro City was named, and The Gentleman, who was always a weird duck, even for this place. Plus, we get to see the over-arching threat that’s been lurking out in the cosmos all these decades. Only slightly disappointed it’s a Cthulhu-type beastie, but it does have nice echoes with the late great MMO City of Heroes.
As always, Busiek, Ross and Anderson have been playing the long game, because a lot of the stuff revealed here was already present back in the day. For instance, The Gentleman’s first appearance had a hint as to his origin, only just now revealed, more than two decades later.
So all in all it far surpassed what I was dreading. I suspect BM will be the star of the next edition, too, since s/he seems to be entangled with the ultimate big bad. But one of the few tropes Astro City hasn’t yet taken on is the world-shattering mega crossover. I hope it’s as big and twisty as the Silver Agent’s story was.
Edit: fixed typos. I had cataracts when I originally wrote this.