Well it’s about time!

After so many months of frustration I finally read a pretty damn good issue of Dial H. China Mieville is a great writer but he is making things way to complicated when it doesn’t have to be. Clearly with this (filler) issue he shows why the series should be simpler and give us a better understanding of what he’s trying to do with this series.

Mieville is clearly deconstruction superheroes, maybe not to the extent as Grant Morrison, by showcasing what it means to be one. Sure you can have ridiculous super powers but it really matters on what you are as a person. In this issue we get a lot of that with having a lot of humor and also a great mindset into what makes Nelson and Roxie tick. I really did love the humor in this coming from how horribly racist Nelson’s new dial hero was. But it worked to what the theme of this issue was so it was nice to see it was for more then just shock value. Also, you get a Pegasus named ‘Wingy’ so what’s not to love?

While we do not get Mateus Santolouco in this issue, as a cover INCORRECTLY indicates, we do get David Lapham on pencils. He must have gotten some of the designs of Nelson’s new hero either from Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Tour or comics from the 1950s because it is dead on. This entire issue takes place in one single room so it must have been a big challenge for Lapham to make this issue interesting. To his credit, his layouts and various flashbacks make sure this isn’t a dull issue to look at. He also proves that anyone can draw some pretty cool looking superheroes even if they’re name isn’t Santolouco.

This issue was definitely a nice, welcomed surprise for me. This series has been a bit of a slog to read with the very wordy dialogue and to Mieville’s credit he tones it down considerably here. Not sure why all of his issues can’t be like this but this issue delivers on some great characterization and humor that was sorely missed before. David Lapham also impresses me by doing layouts that don’t make a mainly talking heads issue interesting and not boring to look at. Hopefully this is the turning point for this series because I really want to love this series just on Mieville’s imagination alone. If anything this is definitely a surprising contender for ‘Best Single Issue’ this year.