The Starting Line: Farmville but with organs in FARMHAND.

It’s the week before Comic-Con and all through the store comics are still stirring. This week, Kirkman tried to put surprise back in comics, Superman got Kryptonian depression, and best of all Chew‘s Rob Guillory has a new series that makes you remember potatoes have eyes.

FARMHAND #1

 

 

 

Art & Story: Rob Guillory

Colors: Taylor Wells

Letters: Kody Chamberlain

Published by: Image Comics

 

Farms are creepy enough in real life. What with the scarecrows, tall cornfields, and old people, but one of the co-creators of Chew is ramping up the eerieness of America’s backbone industry in his new series, Farmhand. Rob Guillory draws and writes this book and it’s every bit as enticing as Chew was.

Farmhand is a story that introduces readers to the Jenkins clan. A seemingly typical American farm industry family. Patriarch, Jedidiah is no ordinary farmer. Through some divine vision he’s discovered how to manipulate human DNA and plants in a way that allows his farm to grow replacement body parts that adapt to match humans. The science of the comic book is a bit of a take on current stem cell research. Through his breakthrough discovery, Jedidah became the most important man on earth and obviously no friend of the big pharmaceutical industry. Though we don’t know the full details of why his biggest rift is with estranged son Zeke. Issue one revolves around Zeke and his own family trying to reconcile with Jedidah while also opening a lot of questions surrounding Jeddidah’s life-changing farm. What exactly happened between Zeke and his father? The farm clearly is more than meets the eye or else this wouldn’t be much of a comic, but is Jedidah the benevolent humanitarian or is there something more sinister in his motives?

Rob Guillory crafts a phenomenal story in this first chapter. There’s such a hook in the enigma of these characters that dares you not to be on board by the last page. Particularly illustrated by the actions Jedidah takes in handling a young spy in his midst. For a moment we believe he could be the simple philanthropist farmer he paints himself then in another instance you have the notion he just might be the true black sheep of the Jenkins family.

The fact that Guillory can create an engaging mystery about something as simple as farming puts him on a new level of creator. Between the story and –as always– stellar artwork of Guillory, Farmhand #1 is not to be missed.

Here’s a short stack of hot takes on most of the #1 comics for the week of 7/11:

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #1 (Marvel)
(W) Nick Spencer (A) Ryan Ottley

X-23 #1	(Marvel)
(W) Mariko Tamaki (A) Juan Cabal (CA) Mike Choi

RUINWORLD #1 (Boom!)
(W) Derek Laufman (A/CA) Derek Laufman
A cutesy character story that wants to be all-ages but falls a bit short of that goal. Great for kids just not a true all-ages book.

DISNEY PIXAR INCREDIBLES 2 #1 (Dark Horse)
(W) Christos Gage, Landry Walker (CA) Gurihiru
Jack-Jack wants his nomnoms and this book delivers hilarity and family in spades. A must for fans of The Incredibles movies.

SHE COULD FLY #1 (Dark Horse/Berger Books)
(W) Cantwell (A/CA) Martin Morazzo
One of the best hooks of any book this year. When a flying woman suddenly appears and dies her legacy becomes the obsession of one little girl who unravels an awesome story.

SUPERMAN #1 (DC)
(W) Brian Michael Bendis (A) Ivan Reis, Joe Prado (CA) Adam Hughes

LOEG TEMPEST #1 (IDW)
(W) Alan Moore (A/CA) Kevin O'Neill
A goregous reprinting of a pivotall comic from across the pond.

TRANSFORMERS UNICRON #1 (IDW)
(W) James Roberts (A/CA) Alex Milne
While it's not quite inviting if you haven't kept up on recent Transformers comics, it is one hell of an end game starter if you are following IDW's Hasbroverse.

OUTPOST ZERO #1 (Image)
(W) Sean McKeever (A/CA) Alexandre Tefenkgi

CASPER AND HOT STUFF #1 (American Mythology Productions)
(W) Patrick Shand, Mike Wolfer (A) Eric Shanower (A/CA) Bill Galvan
The book has some entertaining visual gags and a serviceable story that doesn't require you to be a fan of either character before. Well worth a look if you love classic animation characters.

GFT PRESENTS 2018 COSPLAY SPECIAL #1 (Zenoscope)

METAPHASE #1 (Alterna Comics)
(W) Chip Reece (A/CA) Kelly Williams
A story about a boy who has down syndrome, but happens to have a superhero dad. I'm always weary of how afflictions are handled in storytelling. This one is a bit on the unapologetic side which gives it an endearing quality. Dig it!

MIDNIGHT TASK FORCE #1 (Mad Cave Studios)
(W) Mark London (A/CA) Alejandro Giraldo

MORTE ONE-SHOT (Source Point Press)
(W) Kevin Joseph (A) D.A Bishop
A book about the last man on earth with a bunch of corpses. What could go wrong? Short answer... every thing.

NU WAY #1 (Aspen Comics)
(W) J. T. Krul (A/CA) Alex Konat
It's cyberpunk meets the business of UFC. While the story stumbles over itself a bit in trying to set up too much too soon, the action drawn by Alex Konat is fantastic.

RELAY #1 (Aftershock Comics)
(W) Zac Thompson, Eric Bromberg, Donny Cates (A) Andy Clarke (CA) Christian Ward

VOLTRON LEGENDARY DEFENDER VOL 3 #1 (Lion Forge)
(W) Mitch Iverson (A) Rubine, Beni Lobel (CA) Mariko Yamashin
Five smaller lion robots join to become one super lion robot. Mitch Iverson definitely doesn't mess anything up as this issue does a great job of catching up new readers without making them realize it.