Advance Review: Art Imitates Life In Comics In ‘Tales Of Wonder’ #1
by Tom Smithyman
Overview
Steve Skroce rekindles the old debate about whether the writer or artist is more important to comic books. (Ironically, he’s serving as both in this limited series.) He also takes his pot shots at publishers’ cinematic universes, while creating a unique origin story for his own.
Overall
9/10The never-ending debate of who is more important in comics — the writer or the artist — rages in Steve Skroce‘s Tales of Wonder #1. And in doing so, Skroce lampoons a real-life feud as well as our superhero-obsessed culture.
Skroce, who writes and illustrates this limited series, clearly found his inspiration in the late Marvel publisher Stan Lee — a showman if the industry ever knew one. But Lee (barely obscured here as nonagenarian writer and self-aggrandizer Stu Reeds) was known for overstating much of his work. He played down the contributions of Spider-Man co-creator Jack Kirby.
In Tales of Wonder, the Kirby stand-in Jake Crumsby, harbors resentment for years of being cut out of the recognition for America’s Freedom Force (the Marvel’s Avengers). Freedom Force is bigger than anything the MCU could ever aspire to be. In fact, the franchise is so successful that its own conference dwarfs the legendary San Diego Comic-Con. The die-hard fans know about Jake’s work, but they are pretty much the only ones.
As fascinating as this drama is in real life, Skroce uses it as a way of hooking his audience in, then turning things around. It turns out that neither of these two created Freedom Force. To say any more, though, would delve into spoiler territory.
As an artist, Skroce gives himself free reign create a new superhero team, including Man-Bear, Fly-Boy, and the Ugly American. His artistic style is detailed; for example, you can count the likes on Jake’s weathered face, while Fly-Boy looks only a step away from a well-made movie CGI.
It will be interesting to see where Skroce takes the five-part story. Will the action take over, only to leave Jake and Stu’s rivalry to be an afterthought, or will it dominate the limited series? Regardless of how Skroce concludes the tale, the debate over writer versus artist will rage on. At least in Skroce’s case, he doesn’t have to worry about it in this series.
Tales of Wonder #1 — written and illustrated by Steve Skroce, colored by Ian Herring, and lettered by Pat Brosseau — will be available Wednesday in comic book stories and on digital platforms from Image Comics.
