Nice Guys Finish Last

Everyone in your orbit has mistaken your kindness for weakness, broadcasted your secret identity to the masses and has snickered about your goody-goody image behind your back. Essentially they’ve done about everything except kill your dog and burn down your hometown. If it were you, wouldn’t you be pissed beyond measure? Wouldn’t you decide to turn in your cape for a can whoop ass? Well that’s what Plutonian does in the first volume of Mark Waid’s “Irredeemable’– and as it unfolds you’ll understand why.

Plutonian is on the hunt for his old teammates. It makes you wonder why he would not stop at them, but also go after their families. It’s as if he’s attempting to wipe everything out that has hurt him. He won’t leave a remnant behind. As he destroys nations, former allies and enemies alike, writer Mark Waid forces the reader to step outside the chaos and to look at the plausible actions that would make a superhero turn rogue.

It’s a tricky thing Waid does. As the writer of the iconic Kingdom Come miniseries he gave the likes of Batman, Wonder Woman and Superman a complexity never before or since seen in comics. It made us for a time rethink of these heroes and their motivations. With his comic Irredeemable, now we must see what makes a character not simply step over to the other side, but create a sphere where everyone is afraid of him.

Waid does give us clues. It’s the little things like a former teammate creating robots that look exactly like Plutonian’s greatest enemy. Modeus is the only one who could truly damage Plutonian, yet he is nowhere to be found in this trade. Why would someone who calls you friend build these things? This action turns comic book tropes on its head. Yes, Batman keeps some kryptonite in his utility belt for Superman just in case. But there is precedent for that. Supes has been taken over countless times. Whereas in Waid’s world Plutonian has always been the good guy – always. There was never any need to find a way to neutralize Plutonian. But we are not talking about calming someone down, we’re talking about someone who drowned Singapore because their nation’s leader was sucking up to him.

Philosophical questions aside, the writing is top-notch. You are riveted by the words of these players who are fighting for their very survival. The artwork by Peter Krause only adds the devastating events in this trade, as we see Plutonian create natural disasters then, like a god, float over his work. It’s eerily frightening, and yet, you find yourself rooting for him. He’s no longer a hero, he can’t be controlled and he’s on a mission to obliterate everything, still you feel as if you were in his position you may do the exact thing.

The afterword by Grant Morrison only adds to this trade as he explains what Mark Waid means to the comic book world.

What Waid does best is play with the standard idea of hero, what they do for us and what we resent about them. It also makes for great storytelling.

About Donna-Lyn Washington 639 Articles
Donna-lyn Washington has a M.A. in English from Brooklyn College. She is currently teaching at Kingsborough Community College where her love of comics and pop culture play key parts in helping her students move forward in their academic careers. As a senior writer for ReviewFix she has been able to explore a variety of worlds through comics, film and television and has met some interesting writers and artists along the way. Donna-lyn does a weekly podcast reviewing indie comics and has also contributed entries to the 'Encyclopedia of Black Comics,’ the academic anthology ‘Critical Insights: Frank Yerby’ and is the editor for the upcoming book, ‘Conversations With: John Jennings.’

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