Ten Grand vol. 2

When I talked about how I hoped that “Trees” represented a return to form for Warren Ellis, I was selling him short in that regard.  As I was reminded while reading the first volume of that series, there are a lot of things I like about his comics even if he tends to play up the more tiresome parts of his style in his superhero work.  No, when it comes to creators who have lost their touch over the years, J. Michael Straczynski should be held up as a warning to others.  After his recent superhero work at DC didn’t endear him to anyone — mainly because it included an utterly wrongheaded take on Superman — he has since gone back to putting out creator-owned work at Image with mixed results.  I did like the first volume of this series, and the second has things about it to recommend as well.  If only it didn’t end in an anticlimactic fashion that made me wonder just what the point of it all was.

Joe Fitzgerald knew he’d always wind up in Hell one day, he just didn’t think that would happen before the forces of Heaven were done with him.  Yet it was inevitable that the former hitman would fight his way, alongside an angel no less, through the tricks and traps of Purgatory to get to that infernal realm after the soul of the woman he loved was captured and brought down there.  To his surprise, the demon responsible for all of this has a deal for Joe:  Help them win the war against Heaven and he’ll get to stay with Laura.  It’s an easy choice for a man who has placed his love for this woman above all things.  Too bad that he’s been played from the start by both sides in this divine conflict.

What’s good about this second volume is that Straczynski gets the worldbuilding and rulemaking of this supernatural tale right.  Things started out as a personal quest by one man only to escalate into a battle of biblical proportions.  That it doesn’t come off as being trivialized or overshadowing the main story is an achievement in itself, but the writer keeps the focus where it matters.  Even if most of the action here involves lots of talking heads, I was genuinely involved in seeing Straczynski spell out his worldview regarding Heaven and Hell for the first part of this volume.  It forms a consistent vision for the story and the reader is rewarded when the revelations start coming fast and furious towards the end.

You see, there are a lot of little details strewn throughout these two volumes that come off as inconsequential window dressing at first.  It isn’t until we get to the latter half of this one that we realize to what extent Straczynski was seeding things early on.  There’s some real cleverness here that reminded me of the best “Hellblazer” stories and it was satisfying to see Joe come out ahead of everyone in the end.

That’s in a metaphorical way.  As I mentioned above, the actual ending leaves a lot to be desired.  After all he’s been through and all he’s suffered, Joe’s ultimate request is more than a little mystifying.  You’d think that he’d demand to be with Laura in Heaven, or ask for her to be brought back to life on Earth with a clean slate for himself so they can live out their lives like regular humans in love.  That he doesn’t ask for something like that and instead requests something trivial in comparison just boggles the mind.  Joe’s actual final moments with Laura also feel underwhelming considering the great love they’re supposed to have.  Then again, they only get a couple pages together because Straczynski spends most of the issue with having Joe settle scores on his way out of Purgatory.  Considering that he did such a good job of keeping the focus on the two lovers even in the most bombastic parts of this volume, shortchanging them here feels like the writer was missing the point of it all.  Also, while I can accept Joe continuing to sit there on the final page until it’s time for him to help himself out in Purgatory back in volume one, it also reads like the writer is leaving the door open for future stories involving the character.  That’s something I have deeply mixed feelings about at this point.

I also doubt we’ll be seeing a sequel to “Ten Grand” anytime soon if the sales figures on it are anything to go by.  While the first issue sold over 50K copies, it finished its run well below the 10K level.  You could take that as an indication of how the audience responded to it, but I’m sure the artist switch from Ben Templesmith to C.P. Smith and the numerous delays between issues didn’t help things either.  Some of Templesmith’s art is recycled in this volume for flashback sequences to show you how things were set up early on.  While such a stunt could normally be excused, the two artist’s styles do not mesh well at all and it winds up serving as a reminder that this series was originally drawn by a great artist before a merely good one took over.

C.P. Smith has his own distinct style and I think it was smart on Straczynski’s part to go with an artist whose work doesn’t resemble Templesmith’s in the slightest.  There was even a clever handoff between the two as Smith took over as Joe walked into Purgatory.  I did like the new artist’s style as his computer-assisted work gave the figures and world the look of something crafted out of paper-mache.  It turned out to be very well-suited to showing us the demonic and angelic forces on both sides of the conflict and I give it points just for being different in a good  way compared to most other artists out there.

I’m not sure if other people will feel the same, and whenever his characters get emotional their expressions are exaggerated in a far too cartoonish manner.  Then there’s the matter of how he gives the angel Joe speaks with feminine characteristics.  I realize that he’s just drawing what Straczinski had in his script, but this leads to a scene of Joe issuing a revenge beating down on a woman in the final issue.  Even if she’s not an earthly being, it’s still deeply uncomfortable to witness.

Less depressing is the fact that Matthew Smith contributes a few pages to the final issue.  He’s an artist I’ve never liked because his angular style always struck me as ripping off Mike Mignola’s, only without the style and attention to detail.  To my surprise, Smith’s work here is actually the liveliest I’ve seen from him to date.  It’s not anything that will knock your socks off, but I don’t think I have to dread seeing his name in future projects.

There were many parts of “Ten Grand” that I really enjoyed.  Yet that ending almost makes a wash of them all.  I was just astonished by all of the “What was he thinking?” moments that final issue conjured up.  At least it wasn’t enough to make me regret reading these two volumes.  I won’t warn you against reading them as well, but you’d be better served by picking up Straczynski’s “Midnight Nation” for an example of what the writer was capable of when he still had it.