This week’s Wednesday Comics Reviews starts with a look at the new magic giant hand comic Hammerfist #1, and we also stop by Denver #1! Plus, The Prog Report!
Hammerfist #1
Writer: Rick Remender
Artist: Steve Epting
Colors: Matt Hollingsworth
Letterer: Rus Wooton
Publisher: Image Comics
Review by Gianni Palumbo
Full disclosure, Rick Remender is one of my favorite writers and has written some of my favorite comics of all time. I think his recent run of comics since 2023 with titles like, The Sacrificers, The Seasons, Grommets, Escape, etc. has been absolutely fantastic, and some of the best stuff of his career. To say I was excited for Hammerfist would be an understatement. You have one of my favorite writers teaming up with one of the best artists in the industry — Steve Epting — doing a grounded, gritty, supernatural crime thriller…count me in!
Hammerfist follows Mike Denton, a scummy hitman, junkie, absentee father who lives a life of murder for money, drugs and cheap sex–A typical Rick Remender protagonist (complimentary). What seems like a simple heist job, turns into something supernatural and Mike is caught in something way above his paygrade.
So, what did I think of this first issue? To be honest, I’m not entirely sure yet. Rick Remender has historically been hit or miss for me when it comes to first issues. Even some of my absolute favorites from him I thought had middling first issues when they came out, but they end up being great in hindsight.
He’s very much a “long form” writer and I typically give his series at least a full volume. Hammerfist #1 falls somewhere in the middle. It’s interesting enough to establish the situation, but leaves out lots of, what I assume is going to be, key details that will be explored further on. What I love about Remender books is that he takes a simple genre exercise and twists it into something much more interesting so I’m intrigued by how he will (hopefully) do that here in subsequent issues.
Steve Epting kills it as always. He’s always been a personal favorite of mine ever since I first discovered his work on Captain America with Ed Brubaker. He combined with Matt Hollingsworth’s colors give it that much needed grounded, gritty aesthetic that perfectly matches Remender’s script.
It’s a decent enough first issue but again, I always need at least a first volume when it comes to Rick Remender comics and knowing his track record, I have full faith that this will be a great series.
Denver #1
Writers: Jimmy Palmiotti & Justin Gray
Illustration: Pier Brito
Letters: Bill Tortolini
Publisher: Mad Cave Studios
Review by Clyde Hall
When you hear so much about ‘show, don’t tell’ it’s easy forgetting that sometimes showing is overrated. Telling followed up both directly and indirectly with showing through the aftermath can make a powerful impact, and that’s exactly what you get in the first issue of Denver. It was a 2014 Kickstarter project, now getting a revisit and a bit of a remodel/add-on treatment according to the Afterword so that it can present to a wider audience over the course of 3 issues.
What sort of impact is Denver packing? An Armageddon/doomsday kind. Delivered when a rogue asteroid slammed into the moon and altered its orbit a few hundred yards. The follow up came with a rain of ejecta across Earth, a hailstorm of rock and debris causing widespread destruction and death. As a result, ocean levels rose and scientists estimated anything below 4,000 feet pre-asteroid sea level would be consumed by the rising tides. Countries raced in establishing beachheads using the estimates in places like the Kabul and Pyrenees Mountain ranges, Tibet, and Peru. In America, people scrambled for areas in Utah, Wyoming, and Colorado. Including Denver.
But estimates aren’t reliable, and tides only stopped covering what had been dry land at around 5,000 feet. The Earth became a water world broken up by a meager number of isolated islands capable of supporting life. And Denver became one of the largest habitable areas remaining.
What draws the reader in, though, isn’t only imagining the death and dark times which came during the asteroid event, or even the life-and-death upheaval the world endured immediately after. The creative team tells and shows enough to give us an idea how that turned out. Beyond the doomsday concept itself lies a survival story. And unlike so many Armageddon and dystopia tales, it dwells on diligence rather than desperation. Diligence by survivors like Denver Port authority officer Max Flynn.
Emigrating to Denver from areas outside the city is strictly controlled. Applicants must be screened for health issues, disease, weapons, and drugs. It helps if they have an in-city sponsor vouching for them. And, as existing citizens in Denver pass away, openings are made for refugees to apply. With these sorts of stipulations in place, plus an application process for having a child, population is limited to two million people.
As restrictive as it is, the system is better than letting population exceed food and medical resources, or allowing a sick newcomer to spread an epidemic among one of the last cities left on the planet. And through Max we see that those enforcing the immigration process are thorough, diligent, but also compassionate. They work, even when violations and disqualifications for citizenship arise, to find alternatives. And when someone must be turned away, it’s not without regret.
For the world that exists post-asteroid, Max has a good life. He’s a senior officer and responsible for bringing new Port Authority recruits up to speed in how they do their work, and how they cope with the emotional impact of witnessing suffering, desperate applicants daily. He has two grown kids, a son working for the city as he does, and a daughter attending university. Their mother isn’t in the picture, and it’s inferred that perhaps a health crisis is to blame. But Max is remarried, and wife Betty has been supportive and vital in helping Max handle the pressures of the job. In her, he has someone to come home to and discuss work with openly, honestly, and it mirrors the healthy mindset law enforcement and emergency service workers strive for.
If it seems an idyllic life, given the underwater alternative, it’s also one that outside and inside factions threaten. Restrictions, even ones meant to save humanity, don’t make everyone a fan. And when one of Max’s loved ones is abducted by a masked group of seeming terrorists, they tell him they have demands if he wants to keep their hostage alive. And it’s here we see Max the peaceful man of restriction enforcement begin calling on the mindset of Max the survivor. Max, the one who will make his tormentors wish they were facing someone warm and fuzzy like the Liam Neeson character in Taken.
It’s easy drawing parallels between Mega-City One and Denver in the set up. Both limited in numbers of citizens, both ringed with a Cursed Earth area with threats arising from bands of survivors who cannot enter. But writers Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray avoid the cynical nature of Dredd, at least in the introduction, and that plays well into making a similar post-apocalyptic situation extremely different. As well as refreshing.
The narrative sweeps you in more than enough to begin pondering if the actual Denver powers-that-be are as diligent and fair-minded as Max. If the hooded gang holding his loved ones’ life in their hands is a terrorist or lunatic fringe, or freedom fighters. The story so far leans toward extremists, but it’s well written enough that it could change. Either way, Max is a protagonist the reader can believe in. He’s seen some stuff. Stuff that would break most of us. Yet, he remains dedicated to keeping his city safe and, even more, remaining a decent human being while doing it.
Illustrator Pier Brito breathes a fantastic, futuristic soul into literally every panel of this issue. In his work, the spirit of early Heavy Metal graphics lives again. That isn’t a praise I hand out often. Maybe never before. But it’s never applied more than it does for Brito’s work here. Again, as with the script leaving cynicism aside, the aesthetic and color palette here gently sideline the usual dark, brooding post-apocalypse world for one that is alive and working toward remaining that way. One that’s not only existing but putting its best thrive forward.
If you think the first issue of Denver sounds like your jam, you should know that it literally can be just that. In the Afterword, Palmiotti invites readers to check out Hanscarlmusic.com. There under the title name is a soundtrack scored just for the comic book in its Kickstarter days. I went, I listened, and I’ll be going back. I’ll also be returning for the other issues in this series. It’s the post-apocalyptic tale with a difference I’ve been waiting for.
The Prog Report
2000AD #2495 (Rebellion): This week’s Prog was a fun one. While I don’t think there was necessarily one standout above the rest, like four of the ongoing stories delivered big flourishes that seem to build toward coming conclusions. I would say that both Brink and Nightmare New York have been my favorites of late, and I found their happenings the most engaging this week. They’re very different stories, though, and so they’re exciting events too shared little in common. Brink might be the most patient story in all of comics. It’s never dull, but it does deliver payoffs that hit like a truck when they arrive. Nightmare New York, meanwhile, is a bit flashier, which feels odd to say about something that is essentially historical fiction, albeit occult historical fiction. This week’s installment of that story serves up an absolutely killer full-page splash. Over all, very solid issue this week, one that overall makes it feel like a lot more excitement is en route in the coming weeks. Brink is from writer Dan Abnett, artist INJ Culbard, and letterer Simon Bowland, while Nightmare New York is from writer Kek-W, artist David Roach, colorist Jim Boswell, and letterer Annie Parkhouse. This week’s cover (above) is by Cliff Robinson with colors by Dylan Teague. As always, you can pick up a digital copy of The Prog here. And it is also now available weekly in US comic shops! —Zack Quaintance
Column edited by Zack Quaintance
Read past entries in the weekly Wednesday Comics reviews series or check-out our other reviews here!
