Customer Reviews

Codeflesh

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This trade paperback collects the Joe Casey and Charlie Adlard Codeflesh stories from the "Double Image" comics. It's the story of a bailbondsman, Cameron Daltrey, and his business partner, Staz, who cater to supervillains. When they skip, Cameron dons a UPC-mask (why a UPC, I can't fathom), beats them senseless, and hauls them in, effectively acting as his own bounty-hunter. There are a couple of snags, though. First, since he literally has two jobs, he has no time for his girlfriend. Second, because Cameron has been apprehended in the past for his roughing up supervillains and ordered to cease and desist by a judge, he has to be extra-careful to avoid the cops. The stories are fairly simple, and sometimes stilted, but on the whole they are quite enjoyable. I think that with more issues, the series could form a bit and really take off. My 3-star rating is due to the fact that there is really no detailed examination of Cameron's past activities, nor a reason for why he uses a mask with a UPC, plus the rather sedentary nature of the stories (no real progression, just bail skipping over and over). There is plenty of violence, adult language, and some nudity, so this is definitely not a kid's book. Adlard's art is excellent as usual, looking like a hyper Guy Davis.

Ever since Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns everybody has been trying to deconstruct superheroes, dissecting them to their core elements to see what makes them tick, and putting these elements into a modern real world perspective. It happens so often that it's getting pretty tired. It's rare that a modern deconstruction is interesting or has anything good to say. The few examples of good recent deconstructions are Alan Moore's America's Best Comics line, and Codeflesh by Joe Casey and Charlie Adlard.

Instead of a bright spandex costume we have, like the golden age Sandman, a guy in regular clothes and a strange mask. Instead of foiling the machinations of supervillains, he is a bounty hunter going after bad guys with super powers who have already been arrested and have skipped out on bail. Instead of having a noble purpose he quite clearly is doing it for the rush of beating up guys more powerful than he is. His girlfriend gets tired of wondering why he disappears without explanation or is always late with some lame excuse and dumps him.

Oh, you know how some bad guys "augment" themselves (turn themselves into cyborgs or get bonded to magical suits they can never take off, etc) and you can't help wondering about practical things like how do they go to the bathroom or have sex? Well, that's dealt with pretty directly in here too.

And the artwork by Charlie Adlard is awesome. I've seen his work in Astronauts in Trouble and the Walking Dead and a lot of places in between, and Codeflesh is by far his best stuff. It's all black and white, no zipotones or grayscale, just hard inks. It's dynamic and intense but it reads beautifully.

I do agree with previous reviewers that the story doesn't go anywhere. The end of this collection feels like a "to be continued." But that didn't bother me. I just closed the book wanting more.

Like the introduction says: Why is it called codeflesh? No idea. Never got explained. Why the bar-code mask? No idea. Never got explained. But I had so much fun reading it, I didn't really care.

Codeflesh follows the story of Cameron Daltry, who leads a double life. To friends, and more importantly authorities, he runs an agency that posts bail for criminals. Secretly he is responsible for collecting those criminals when they skip bail. His disguise is a bag with a bar code printed on it that he wears over his head. This double life takes most of his time and with the collecting prisoners bit tends to be unpredictable. This causes continual trouble with his hot stripper girlfriend.

So the stories in Codeflesh tend to follow the same pattern: As Codeflesh, Cameron fights and conquers a criminal (they all have superpowers, but other than criminals with superpower it appears to take place in the real world in any big city), then he tries to make up to his girlfriend who he has shown up late for on account of fighting some criminal. The first few stories are pretty good but then it starts to get too repetitive.

Each story is drenched in testosterone. At all points in the stories all men look like they could use a shower. Violence abounds as does cussing.

Mostly this comic shows potential. It isn't so good by itself, but I would read something else put out by the same people.