Umbrella Academy is a comic book series written by My Chemical Romance’s lead singer, Gerard Way, and drawn by Brazilian comic book artist, Gabriel Ba, fresh from Matt Fraction’s and his Casanova (which, sadly, I still haven't read), about seven children born with super powers and their relationships with each other and their adopted father, Professor Hargreeves, aka the Monocle.
A list of the most obvious influences on
The series begins with a wrestling match between “Tusslin’ Tom” Gurney and the Space Squid from Rigel X-9, immediately followed by the birth of 43 children born to women who had up until this point shown no signs of being pregnant. We also learn that Professor Hargreeves, a wealthy inventor, gold medalist, Nobel Prize winner (for giving human level intellect to chimpanzees), and alien, is attempting to adopt as many of these children as he possibly can. He manages to adopt seven and when asked why, he responds, “To Save The World!”. These first few pages set the tone for the rest of the series.
Then we flash forward 10 years, and the zombified Gustave Eiffel is activating the Eiffel tower for launch into space. The children adopted by Professor Hargreeves rush in to save
Flash forward again, 20 years this time. We meet Number 1 (aka Spaceboy) holding vigil on the moon. He is watching out for an invasion force that may never come. He gets a call that his “father” has died. His family is gathering together again for the first time in a long time. Obviously a lot has happened and the children have grown apart and all of them are estranged from Professor Hargreeves. The problem is, the
The Royal Tenenbaums influence is felt in scenes with the family relationships and interaction. One of the other Wes Anderson influences is in the choice of Hargreeves' assistant/valet. The Doom Patrol and Grant Morrison’s influence is felt all over the place, there is more story in the first issue than most 6 issue series. Like Morrison, Way doesn’t hold any ideas back. Anything and everything he has is on the page. The Mignola influence is also all over the place, especially, Amazing Screw-On Head.
Unfortunately, for my money the last two issues are a bit of a let down. All of this story is building and ends in an anti climactic ending. When you consider the end of the series, that may seem like a strange statement, but for all of the story crammed into the first two issues, the last two issues almost seem slow. The end does fit the story, but it lacks the zest of the rest of the series.
The
Where to start?:
2 Page Preview from DarkHorse.com
Dark Horse Comics Presents #1 on MySpace.comDark Horse Comics Presents #12 on MySpace.com
The Umbrella Academy Volume 1 TPB
The Umbrella Academy: Apocalypse Suite Limited Edition HC
Other Products:
I don't drink coffee, but this mug makes me think I should.
Products I’d like to see:
Umbrella Academy is definitely a Hot Buy.
1 comment:
After looking over the online previews, I liked what I saw. Story and art seem to flow well together - which is something that to doesn't happen to often.
I have already put this on my order lists. Thanks.
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