Being psychic sounds like a pretty sweet deal. All the things you can do to people by just using mind. Too bad Fred Van Lente’s “Brain Boy†should stay out of any san person’s mind.
Here we find special agent Matt Price, AKA Brain Boy, a telepath working for his parents employer Albright Industries is on a mission to protect a weapon carried by the president called “the football.†This all goes array when the weapon and the president get kidnapped along with a girl who is also a telepath.
One positive note is the story is told from a first person narrative in a way that is pretty close to how a telepath may think. Matt is constantly hearing other people’s thoughts and can tell a little bit about their future. It is an interesting take on an already established storytelling form. Unfortunately, the story reads like the typical popcorn action flick in comic form. The characters aren’t really anything special, not even Matt. They are about as flat and basic as they get.
Even the action scenes aren’t that interesting. It is the basic psychic attacks where a character gets blown up or gets possessed and attacks either themselves or somebody else. There is very little tension in any of these scenes. They just happen with the reader not caring at all.
The art by Freddie Williams II isn’t anything worthwhile. It looks like your typical modern comic art with very little variation in style. Both the style and colors used make this comic look boring and uninteresting. The reader will be reading the inner monologue and ignoring the action on the page.
“Brain Boy #0†is an underwhelming run of the mill action comic with equally underwhelming art. Fred Van Lente is capable of doing something remarkable and this one isn’t.
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