Cla$$war

The American is angry.  I’m not talking about the general public of this country, I’m talking about the leader of the superhuman team known as Enola Gay.  The team has been the tip of the spear for our country’s foreign policy since the First Iraq War and the American has been going along with it because he believes we represent the greater good.  No more, however, as he’s since learned about who our government is really beholden to and the lengths they’ll go to in order to maintain that power.  Now he’s ready to make those people pay, starting first with the President.

“Cla$$war” was originally published for three issues in 2002 and three more in 2004.  It arrived in the aftermath of both “The Authority” and 9/11 and boy does it show.  You’ve got the Superman-esque leader turning on his country for what he believes are the right reasons served up with over-the-top action and a social awareness that were missing from nearly all mainstream comics at the time.  It must’ve been a bracing read for anyone who encountered the series in those periods with writer Rob Williams delivering plenty of angry energy in his script and artists Trevor Hairsine and Travel Foreman running with the bloody violence they were asked to depict.

While the art has held up pretty well – particularly Foreman’s work as there’s a scale and intensity here that you don’t see from his modern efforts – the story has not.  “Cla$$war” today reads like a tired exercise in shock value where its anti-government rage comes off as quaint in terms of how little things have changed since and American’s meager accomplishments over the course of the story.  It’s interesting to read Williams’ afterword (reprinted here from a 2008 collection) and see how much things changed for him after this series served as his breakthrough into the industry.  He also says that the series has yet to be completed (with issues #7-12), but I can’t get excited about that based on what I’ve read here.