Adventureman #3 by Matthew Fraction and the Dodsons

 

So when we left Claire she had just stumbled into the family dinner.  OK there was a gap of some hours between when we saw last saw her until the dinner. It's a mystery what happened to her and one that should be solved in this installment. Let's see what Matt Fraction wrote.

The family is concerned and they race her to the Emergency Room.  Claire feels great and she can hear again (or at least partially).

When one of the cops she saw last issue is brought in injured.  He was injured in a bug attack and is losing blood.  He's AB- and Claire declares that she's multiversal blood type n and after an Adventureman flashback she gives him a transfusion of blood.

Record scratch - WHAT THE BUTTS?????

multiversal type n???  Fine, he's AB- but O- is the universal donor and can be given to anyone.  I get that they may have limited blood stocks but to make up a blood type from the whole cloth - which you don't really explain I was yanked out of the story sooooo fast.

Now I'll accept a lot in my pulp and pulp-adjacent fiction, I mean I'm the guy who wrote about a ray that causes the blood to rust (or at least appear to rust)  check out my novel Australis Incognito for more details.

But the type n blood was a step too far for me.

It may seem that I'm hard on this book and I am - I have high expectations of this story.

Back to the story, we get the information that Claire's dad may have been the Chief of Police as Claire's old partner calls him Chief.  

Then we're told that Claire appears to have grown fifteen inches (37.5 cm) but I'm not quite seeing that growth reflected in art.  (BTW the Dodson's art is gorgeous)

The MRI scan shows Claire's brain is active, really active.

And we're half way through the book and the mystery is set up and Claire can't remember what happened to her.

She goes home with her father where they along wih her son watch an Adventureman serial.  "Fair Phantom of the Lost Fortress" is the title (the other appears to be Adventures of A Dark Tomorrow)

As Claire watches she declares that she remembers.

But we leave Claire to see what is happpening with Baron and Baroness Bizarre torturing Philanda Phade - the ghost assistant of the original Adventureman.  There's several pages of Baron Bizarre talking where they are trying to release Abbathexiddion the Beast-GOd of the Ultravoid.  It ends with the Beast-God sending the Baroness to take the head of Adventureman.

The we get several pages of anecdotes and sketches about the creation of Claire's family and specifically her sisters.

I get the feeling that this comic would do better with less behind the scenes and more background, make it more like Watchmen where the back matter tells us about the classic pulp era Adventureman - excerpts from "the Great Pulp Heroes", fanzine articles about the Adventureman serials, interviews with the original pulp author, explanations about the magic pill Adventureman takes (because for all the mystery it seems obvious that Claire has taken that drug)

Pulp should be fast paced we are now three issues into the series and very little has happened.  I'm sticking with the book because it seems that we are building to something in the next issue but we need more answers and explanations of this world.