By: Gail Simone (story), Freddie Williams II (art), Chris Sotomayor (colors)
The Story: The Movement considers whether it should go after cops or serial killers.
The Review: To be completely honest, I get a little wary of these titles that clearly have some kind of political agenda it wants to convey. Call me pessimistic, but I’m never really sure how many people outside of comics truly understand the issues anyway, or at least understand them enough to justify their stridence. So what’s the likelihood that comic book writers have the requisite knowledge to depict socio-political matters with any kind of credibility?
Besides, when you have superheroes involved, all those kinds of problems tend to wind up beside the point anyway. Writers certainly want to avoid the sticky ethical question that arises when one or several powerful individuals decide to use their powers to solve a problem whose resolution properly belongs to society. In this respect, Simone comes out ahead because the Movement includes more than just the costumed metahumans, but an entire community as well.
However, even Simone can’t seem to break free of the demands of what is still basically a superhero series. Even if the Movement is ostensibly driven by all the people of the ‘Tweens, ultimately, it’s the ones with powers who take center focus in the story and who enforce their neighborhood laws. It also seems like they’re the ones who define the law in the first place. While Burden, a mentally disordered newcomer to the ‘Tweens, gets included on the “war council,” no one without any powers gets the same honor.
None of the metahuman members seem to realize the hypocrisy of them making decisions on behalf of the entire Movement without the consent or even knowledge of everyone else who’s part of it. Virtue in particular is fallible to making gut judgments without thinking through their broader implications. She justifies Burden’s presence on the council solely because “[w]e need more muscle”—for his powers, essentially, rather than any legitimate qualification. And even the corrupt Officer Whitt sees some kind of irony in her imprisoning him in a place where sweatshop workers had been imprisoned (to their doom, a la the Bangladesh factory disasters).*
So the Movement’s vigilante leaders don’t exactly have a lot of credit going into whatever it is they’re trying to do. Even they don’t seem to know that answer.* Do they want to make justice by setting an ethical example of it, or simply by rooting out injustice and squashing it? That’s the big conflict, with Virtue and Tremor on the former side of the question and Katharsis on the latter. It’s pretty interesting that Katharsis doesn’t feel like morality has anything to do with their work here: “You’re a good person, Virtue. Which makes you the last thing we need.”
In the end, Simone punts most of these questions, instead letting the cast go off to dole out justice in their respectively violent ways. At least in the process you get a better sense of their characters, even if it’s relatively limited. Some, like Tremor, are deliberately reserved and mysterious (we get no clarification to accusations of her being a “traitor” or “inside man”); others are typically Simone in their personality, which nowadays means weird for weirdness’ sake (Mouse weeps over the death of Trouncer, his favorite rat, then realizes, “I kinda really wanna sorta eat him.”). We still don’t know if we particularly like them or not, but it’s still early, and Simone’s characters don’t tend to be immediately attractive anyway.
While the script in this issue makes me a bit concerned about the title’s future, the art makes me actively dread it. Williams’ art may just barely miss the borderline of being outright unpleasant to look at, but it’s the visual equivalent of the average teenager’s room: mostly messy with perhaps a few patches of cleanliness. Even if you can look past the blurry linework, the squashy, cartoony look of Williams’ art just doesn’t seem at all suited to the urban tension that Simone revels in.
Conclusion: For all its pretense at commentary, The Movement is at its core a superhero series, and sadly, that defeats much of the novelty and significance it might otherwise have. Williams’ weak art practically finishes the job of establishing this series as a disappointment.
Grade: C
– Minhquan Nguyen
Some Musings: * I find it almost shocking that Virtue doesn’t snap back with the logical response that you imprison people as punishment (for example, when a cop molests an arrestee’s innocent partner), not just to prevent workers from lowering productivity by taking bathroom breaks. There’s no need for her defensiveness in this particular situation.
* Which puts them on par with the actual Occupy protests which clearly inspired them.
Grade
Conclusion