Ghostbusters: Legion #1

[The_Adventurer]

Writer : Andrew Dabb
Penciler : Steve Kurth
Inker : Serge LaPointe

We catch up the Ghostbusters 6 months after the Gozer insident, things are pretty status quo, the Buster business is good, Peter continues to building up the Ghostbuster's PR, Egon continues to be oblivious to Jeanine's passes, and Winston collects his pay check. Everything's chipper except for Ray, who's feeling rather down in the dumps with the current status of the Ghostbusters, he wants them to be Scientists and win Nobel Peace Prizes, and not be a bunch of glorified Exterminators. Meanwhile in an mental institute in Albany a mysterious crazy is making deals with unseen forces. Troubles a-brewing.

Great first issue, brought everyone up to speed on the characters, nailed all the personalities on the head, managed to incorperate primarily Movie continuity, but with just a touch of the cartoon (the Containment Unit and it's basement is the Cartoon incarnation). Solid writing, the art wasn't fantastic, but it was easy on the eyes and doesn't bother. Everyone should check it out.

B+

[Xaraan]

This was better than I thought it would be.

You nailed it pretty good there Adventurer.

I would have liked to see something more happen in this issue, as it really felt like a reintroduction to the characters and it felt like I was reading part one of a mini-series. But then again, I was.

Not bad. I might say C+ though.

[Commander X]

I enjoyed the issue, but I'm still not sure what to think about them making it more modern day. Not sure why having Venkman use a cell phone bugged me... can't say that leaving it in the 80's would have been better. Something I noticed, though. I do look forward to seeing where this goes.

[punkmonkey]

GHOSTBUSTERS #1
“Legion” Pt. 1 of 4
88 mph Studios -- $2.95 / 22 pgs.
Writer: Andrew Dabb
Penciler: Steve Kurth
Inkers: Pierre-Andre Dery & Chuck Gibson
Colorist: Blond
Cover Artist: Kurth/ Dan Brereton (variant)

Reviewed By: Jared Moraitis
Grade: Story -- B-

At last, a nostalgic 80’s revival comic that isn’t being released in conjunction with a toy line or animated series (at least not yet). Because of this, you get a feeling that the book exists as an entity of its own, free from the shackles of concurrent merchandising efforts. I’m not saying books like G.I. JOE and TRANSFORMERS are bound by such shackles (indeed the opposite seems to be true as those books have pretty much blazed their own trail), but this book has a much more independent feel to it. The original Ghostbusters movie remains a quirky favorite of mine, so this book had a lot to live up to, and it was easy to compare this comic to the movie, being so familiar with the latter.

When I first heard this series announced, I was skeptically excited (if one can be such a thing) -- I loved the idea of a faithful Ghostbusters comic, but the unknown 88 MPH Studios and creative team didn’t exactly instill me with unwavering hope. I had to adopt a wait-and-see attitude that paid off in the end, for the most part. I had also wondered how they would handle the continuity issues -- would they pick up after the second film, or treat the popular and quirky animated series as part of the canon? Would “Extreme Ghostbusters” factor in (heaven forbid)? It seems the creative team has chosen to pick up soon after the end of the first movie, which is a fine place to start, but I also wonder whether they are disregarding the second film, or merely treating this comic as occurring in between the two movies. If they are doing the in-between thing, then Lewis Tully is in for a fall from grace, because he seems to have achieved a sort of geek-celebrity status in this book, yet we know he’s back to being a plain old schlub in GB 2. Anyway, it’s probably wise to ignore the animated series’ continuities and just stick with the movies. The appearances of the characters will take some getting used to, however, as they don’t exactly correspond to the familiar looks of either the movie characters or their animated counterparts, but they’re still rather easily identifiable and skew closer to the animated likenesses (gone is Egon’s bizarre white spiral cowlick hairdo, though). I’m assuming there were some legal issues that presented the artist from caricaturing the actors’ likenesses.

I was very pleasantly surprised by how well writer Andrew Dabb retained the flavor of that first movie, both in the dialogue and the characterization of the returning players, even building upon smaller character traits that weren’t at the forefront of my recollection (like Lewis Tully’s persistent attempts to push mutual funds on his acquaintances). All of the characters remain essentially the same, although they are reacting accordingly to the recent battle with Gozer. Tully’s newfound celebrity is a nice touch, as is Ray’s depression, but the threat of this new paranormal adversary is not really given a solid enough set-up. This allows for a sense of mystery and a bit of foreboding, but there was no real hook to instill a sense of dread anticipation in the reader.

The artwork, provided by Steve Kurth (who helped kick off Devil’s Due’s G.I. JOE relaunch) and a mystery inker (the interior lists inkers Pierre-Andre Dery and Chuck Gibson while the cover credits a “LaPointe” as inker) is pretty good, although it seems to take a more cartoony approach than I was expecting. A bit of refinement is needed, I think, as the linework tends to be a bit choppy at times and a few facial expressions seem a bit awkward. Still, there’s a noticeable improvement over Kurth’s G.I. JOE work, so I applaud him for that and remain assured he will continue to improve. Blond’s colors are clear and well-done throughout the issue, though it leans into an over-computerized quality occasionally and I wondered why he/she chose not to have the glowing poltergeists cast a reflective light on surrounding objects and the environment.

The creative team and publisher have given me every assurance that GHOSTBUSTERS could work very well indeed as a comic by maintaining the flavor, atmosphere and humor of the first movie and presenting this book with some nice production values. I hope this book will meet with success while putting but 88 MPH on the map as a competitive publisher much as TRANSFORMERS did for Dreamwave and G.I. JOE did for Devil’s Due.