By: Brian Clevinger (writer), Scott Wegener (art), Ronda Pattison (colors), Jeff Powell (letters) & Lee Black (editor)
The Story: Robo learns adventuring techniques under the tutelage of crime fighting gunman, Jack Tarot.
What’s Good: This fifth volume of Atomic Robo is showing off Robo’s early life in the early 1930’s before he became an international action hero. He very much reminds me of a husky, 14 year old boy in these stories as he chaffs under Telsa’s strict (but loving) rules and wants to go learn about adventuring and crime fighting from the dashing Jack Tarot (and possibly love from his comely daughter).
What really makes this issue sing are the things that have defined this series since it began: Robo’s awkwardness and desire for adventure and Tesla being the ultimate geek dad. Seriously, Telsa would be the most embarrassing dad a teenage robot could have with all his idiosyncrasies. Just the saltine cracker eating is off-the-charts weird. And you have Clevinger’s humorous dialog such as a scene where Jack Tarot doesn’t want to train Robo due to a misadventure they’d had the night before with a huge robot: “You nearly got me killed!“, yells an exasperated Jack. A humble/smug Robo just says, “And I nearly saved your life! Kinda balances out.” There is at least one panel on every page that makes me snicker with its understated humor.
Of course, none of this would work nearly as well without Wegener’s clever work with Robo himself. He manages to tease a lot of acting and emotion out of Robo and that’s impressive because Robo doesn’t even have a mouth or eyebrows (or many of the other tools artists can use to show emotion). Everything seems to come from the eyes/eyelids, the tilt of his head and the basic body posture and you always know whether Robo is happy, sad, deep in thought, etc. Love it.
What’s Not So Good: There’s nothing bad in this issue, but I always feel a little unfulfilled when Robo doesn’t fight some robot or dinosaur and we only get to see that in flashback in this issue. It’s understandable since this is issue #3 out of 5 and you must have some dramatic flow to the series, but I still miss it.
I also found the love angle for Robo a little odd. Not odd as a conceptual idea. I can completely see how a cloistered young lady might be attracted to Robo, but I’m not sure if I would have gone there because once we actually see that on the page, my brain instantly wonders, “Now how the hell does that work?”
Conclusion: Atomic Robo is always fun. This issue has a bit more character development for the metal guy without losing the trademark sense of humor that this series is known for.
Grade: B
-Dean Stell
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