Customer Reviews

Rising Stars : Born In Fire (Vol. 1)

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

J. Michael Straczynski of Babylon 5 fame turns his epic storytelling to the comics page. In Rising Stars, he's laid the groundwork for an enormous story, one with a definite beginning, middle, and end, that will take years to tell (like Babylon 5). And he gets off to an amazing start.

The first four issues in this 8-issue collection tell the story of a strange force which strikes the town of Pederson, Illinois. The force affects only the 113 in utero babies at the time of impact; all 113 are born with superhuman powers. The story is told by Poet, one of the 113, and he tells it from 60 years or more after the force struck. The story is told in an elaborate and fascinating flashback structure; and through it we meet many members of the enormous cast, and also learn that one of them began murdering the others.

Issues 5-8 are a letdown from this incredible setup. Instead of continuing as an inventive superhero murder mystery, it devolves into a generic superhero punch-'em-up. We learn who the killer is in book 5 (WAY too early to be giving out that information), battle lines are drawn, sides are chosen, and shots start getting fired. Even more cliched are the shadowy government conspiracy figures who keep dropping in and out of the narrative. And, worst of all, the Bible-thumping televangelist is cast as the slimy evil manipulating vermin. I have no love for televangelists, that's for sure, but to make the televangelist the villain? It's SO easy. It's SO obvious. Straczynski can do better.

Now, it's probably too early to be doubting Straczynski's storytelling skills. Babylon 5 only got better year after year, after all. And 8 issues is VERY early into the proposed run of Rising Stars. Which is why I will be sure to pick up Vol. 2, whenever it comes out. If it weren't Straczynski, and if he hadn't created such a fascinating world in the first 4 issues, I wouldn't be saying that. But I trust Straczynski to climb out of the rut he dug himself into in books 5-8.

A note about the artwork: generic Todd MacFarlane/Image comics school of art. Totally lacking in distinction, but it gets the job done.

5 stars for the 1st half. 2 1/2 stars for the second half.

This is, by far, one of the greatest comics I've ever read. A great story line, well developed characters, fantastic artwork, and JMS's engrossing writing makes Rising Stars a true classic. The story is written with such authenticity and emotional depth you are drawn into the world of "The Specials". It's a real thinking persons comic (but don't think it's all dialogue...there are great battles and superhero action sequences in every issue !).

I think JMS did a great job in portraying what would happen if ordinary people were given great powers. Who would use it for Evil? Who would use it for Good? Would the world embrace these "Specials" or fear them? JMS lays out a world where all these ideas are explored. Rising Stars is a comic that exemplifies all the qualities of great comics.

Highly recommended !

Also recommended: Anything by J. Michael Straczynski,
Kingdom Come by Alex Ross, Star Wars Tales TBP Vols 1 & 2, Sojourn by Crossgen comics

Ever since Moore and Gibbon's WATCHMEN - adult writers who grew up in the age when comics were still a form of mass entertainment have been asking, "Well, what if all this were real? What if people with extraordinary abilities really existed right outside my window? How would they act and how would the world react?" jms takes another look at this stituation with another set of eyes... this is the first chapter (or book)in that exploration. And it's good, very good. Some have correctly pointed out that the second half of this book becomes pedestrian. Maybe... but if jms' other works are an indication, he's lulling the reader into a false sense of "been there, seen that" before really turning over the table. And without spoiling anything, readers who follow the newstand releases can readily tell that the story is now in a place far from what one might expect from the latter part of this book... Give it a try - you won't be disappointed. If you stick with the story though to its conclusion, I'm willing to bet you may experience a few surprises...

George RR Martin's Wild Cards series is similar on many levels, but I enjoyed this first book enough to read it in a single sitting - a task that unfortunately required but three hours of my time. I'm not a fan, in particular, of JMS, but after an enthusiastic conversation in a comic shop about something on par with "Astro City", I decided to pick this book (novel) up.

It's not Astro City. It's not "Wild Cards" (although, with only a little malice, I could say that it tries). I got a bit tired of the single-page descriptions of the Specials while the main characters, particularly the narrator, remained so undefined. Still, it was a good read, and I'll pick up the next one.

I really like novels and fiction about super heroes. I feel something can be added in a purely verbal medium, and as much as I like plain old comic books, I think novelizations need to be supported; better to move the genre to a new form than to lose it entirely. ...

For the rest, I see potential for a reasonably smart "super hero story", something that's not all that easy to come by.

As for JMS & comic fans who stumble on this review, I strongly urge all of you to also look into the whole Wild Cards series.

The story is told well, but that's because Cover is working off of Stracynski's original story. The Graphic Novel is better. I was hoping for more insite into characters, more depth than can be put into the GN, but that isn't so. If this had more depth I'd have appreciated it more. For what I got out of this novel, I could have read the Graphic Novel (and did prior to reading this). I got nothing new about the characters, no new details or insites into the chararacters or the story. Pity. If Cover had done more with it, it could have been quite good, considering he had really great material to work with.

First, let's get this clear: This is a compilation of issues 1-8 of a comic book that's projected to go on for quite a while. Not a whole lot is settled by the time the book ends. If you get into this story, you're in for the long haul.

That said, it's a very good story. Like my all-time favorite comic book, _Watchmen_, Rising Stars gets deep into the motivations of all the featured superheroes. Straczynski also has come up an new twist on the genre- while all the superheros share a common origin, they also share a particular bond that drives the plot. Furthermore, it's already been made clear that the creation of the superheroes is a significant plot element, and that we haven't been told the secret about it.

Finally, the main character, Poet, has a mythic quality that has a lot of emotional resonance for me. After only a couple of issues, I knew I had to know how it all ended. If that isn't good writing, I don't know what is.

JMS' "Rising Stars" comic series is fantastic - unfortunately, the novelization isn't. It adds virtually nothing to the story, instead plodding through the series almost page by page adding just enough description to let the faithfully quoted comic text make sense. Apart from as a service to the visually impaired, I don't know why this book *exists*. Do yourself a favor and get the comic version instead (the first sixteen issues are conveniently collected in two trade paperback editions).

J. Michael Straczynski continues to impress me. This little-known book (Rising Stars: Vol. 1) is a storytelling gem. His character development is top-notch. He's one of just a handful of writers that can take a super hero story and make it feel real.

Volumes 2 and 3 are also well crafted. My only complaint is the constant change of artists. All of the artists are good, it just disturbs the flow of the books a bit. Straczynski's masterful writing makes up for this minor gripe.

Check out J.M.S.'s "Supreme Power" books, and also "Midnight Nation," both are stunning titles. These books are for older audiences, not that they're overly sexual or violent, I just don't think they are intended for kids.

Happy reading!

Every few years a writer manages to create a comic book that sets a standard within the genre. Miller did so for revamps with "The Dark Knight Returns", Gaiman did so for tragic heroes with "Sandman", and of course there is Moore's "Watchmen", which basically set the standard for comic writing in general.

And now, we have "Rising Stars" which raises the bar for social interaction and commentary on the nature of man.

While "Rising Stars" is indeed a superhero series, the most important aspect is not the heroes - it's the conflict of ideals between the Specials and the human race. Given the amount of racial tension present in human history, "Rising Stars" poses an excellent question: "How would humanity react to the sudden emergence of 113 superpowered beings?"

Straczynski is obviously capable of very powerful, insightful storytelling--just watch seasons 2-4 of Babylon 5. He's really off his game here, though. He starts creating an interesting tale in the vein of Watchmen, but without anything near the density and depth of that series/graphic novel. Here in Rising Stars the narrative is poorly paced overall and suffers from a number of other flaws:

* It's sometimes hard to tell which characters are which at first. (And why does Flagg/Patriot have black hair in the first issue and blond hair later? That doesn't help matters.)

* It's hard to get a read on what the various characters are all about. Give us more characterization, more motivation, more reason to give a darn about them. That's especially true of the lead protagonist, who's very bland and unsympathetic. It's hard to care about a conflict unless you first care about the people involved in it--that's Writing 101 stuff, very surprisingly neglected here, given the way JMS handled the Narn-Centauri conflict in Babylon 5.

* SPOILER! The scenes where the killer reveals himself to Joshua and his father and where they create a conspiracy through the government are just horribly paced, seemingly thrown together in a heartbeat with no decent setup or sense of drama. You're left to guess at any deeper motivations, and not in the good sense of being left wondering in anticipation, but rather just wondering why the author painted everything in such broad, clumsy strokes.

* As others have noted, the second half of the book devolves into very juvenile, cliched superheroics. The author is capable of way more than that, and so are comics (see Watchmen again, for a classic example). Please, no kids' stuff, JMS!

Hopefully the storytelling will gain refinement, depth, and better pacing in the later issues, but I'm not even sure if I'll give them a try now.

As for the art, it's all over the map technically and stylistically, thanks to an army of different pencillers, inkers, and colorists. It starts fine and mostly keeps going downhill, with the last few issues pretty pedestrian, if not weak.

The real problem is that no matter how nice some individual images look, the visual storytelling falls flat almost everywhere--just one jumbled, cluttered, hyper-dense page after another. Check out David Lloyd's work on V for Vendetta to see a master of pacing, grace, and restraint at work.

This series has some potential, but it really doesn't capitalize on it in this volume.