And given the context, I think there's a good chance I've been telepathically "pushed" into changing my mind, possibly from beyond the grave. But never mind, eh? Let's talk about Psi-Force!
A couple of years ago, I lamented that I'd never read a comic I liked that was written by Stephen Perry, even though he'd written some excellent episodes of Thundercats and he did have a handful of comic-writing credits to his name. Before writing that rather sweeping dismissal of his entire literary oeuvre, I did go back and re-read the first issue of Psi-Force, to see if it was as bad as I remembered from my previous encounter with the series, and concluded that it really was dull and uninteresting. Possibly I was just in the wrong frame of mind.
Because as I mentioned recently (and this really is turning into a blog where I just read other, better, blogs and comment on them, so I do apologise for that), Tom Brevoort is working through the New Universe comics of 1986 with analysis, commentary and interesting anecdotes about their creation. And since he's already covered Star Brand and Spitfire, the two I read at least some of, forty years ago, I thought this would be a good time to go back and remind myself what happened in the others. My experience of the New Universe has been very piecemeal over the years, picking up odd comics here and there and generally thinking "What was that supposed to be all about, then?" - which might not have given me the best impression of the line, although it does seem to tally with what most fans say about them...
Psi-Force was created by Archie Goodwin and Walt Simonson, but for some reason they didn't write or draw the comics themselves. Instead, it was drawn by the talented but inexperienced Mark Texeira (he'd drawn He-Man mini-comics and an issue of Transformers before this, so you can tell he was good!) and written by Steve Perry, best known for those few great episodes of the Thundercats cartoon.
So, we've got a team of pre-created characters, handed to people who've done a good job with toy tie-in fiction before now. It should work. And I think my problem with Psi-Force before now is that it's just not that kind of comic at all, and it's harder to get a handle on what kind of comic it is meant to be. But now, reading the first two issues (after which Perry was replaced by Danny Fingeroth), I find they do have a real appeal to them!
The story starts in medias res, with Emmett Proudhawk, known as "Hawk", trying to rescue teenage Anastasia "Stasi" Inyushin from the sinister Russians who say she belongs to them. It's all very dark and gritty. Hawk has telepathic powers, and can make people do what he wants, within limits. Stasi has the power to heal people, although again her powers are limited and difficult for her to use.Hawk has also brought along telekinetic teen Kathy Ling, although she's not at all an action hero, and is horrified to see there are people with actual guns, trying to kill people!
Our heroes get away in the end, though Hawk's been shot repeatedly, and regroup in "Sanctuary", a home for teenage runaways in San Francisco, where we meet the rest of the team.
The art in these comics is actually really good. A lot of small panels on each page, sometimes more than ten, and a lot of text to go with them, you really get your money's worth. Modern American comics have moved a long way away from this kind of thing, which is a great shame. There's more content in this one than in twelve monthly issues of the comics you'll see on the shelves today...
Nobody except Hawk has any kind of superhero name, or costume, and they're all teenagers from around America who Hawk has brought here. All of them had previously tested as having high-level ESP, but all have recently developed much more dramatic psychic powers after the "white event" that enveloped the planet and was the central plotline of the New Universe comics.
Wayne Tucker has telepathic powers like Hawk, and spends the entire first two issues announcing that he doesn't want to be part of the group and is leaving, right now. He never does, and we can't help wonder if Hawk has been keeping him there. Hawk is very reluctant to use his powers on the kids, but he does do it later in this same issue, sending them out against their will when Stasi runs back to the Russians to try to save the others from danger. Later issues of the series get more explicit about this, but in these first two it's more subtly done.
The others are Tyrone Jessup, token black guy with astral projection powers, and Michael Crawley, little nerd who can make things blow up. All five of the teens are new to their powers and haven't entirely learnt to focus them into anything useful. Which is a good way to start a series - the superhero norm is that people immediately gain full control over their amazing powers, whip up a colourful costume and go out to fight crime, but this one really hits the "more realistic" tone that the New Universe was striving for.
Hawk has had a dream or vision of a hawk protecting five rabbits who combine to form some sort of super-hawk. It's presented as stereotypical "Indian mysticism", but it actually feels a bit more Old Testament than anything from Native American traditions. And like all good dreams, it comes true by the end of the first issue. Hawk is killed by Mindwolf, the Russian head bad guy, and the teens find that they can use his amulet, Captain Planet style, to summon Psi-Hawk, a manifestation of Hawk as a more standard superhero!
(This comic predates Captain Planet, by the way.)
And the second issue is more of the same, and actually a very compelling read - it details at length the kids trying to get back to Sanctuary, carrying Hawk's body, and being chased not by the Russians this time, but by Hawk's old colleagues in the CIA. Who don't yet know that Hawk is dead, and are working on the assumption that he's out there somewhere, so the feds are just after the teenagers to find out where.
It's all very grim and down-to-earth, but the individual personalities of the kids come across pretty well (they're still basically stereotypes, but you feel like we're getting to know them better) and there's a great sense of them being entirely out of their league...
And Psi-Hawk just comes to the rescue in the end, and I'm feeling like this comic would actually work better without that deus ex machina hanging around - especially since both he and Wayne are able to blank out people's memories after every encounter.
So it's certainly not perfect, but reading these two comics again now has really made me like them! I feel like the later issues of the series drift off into more conventional territories, but taking the Perry issues on their own, there's a definite feeling of new, exciting and different, by the standards of 1986 comics.
So, in summary, it turns out there IS a comic by Stephen Perry that I like! Yay! I'm just sorry it took me so long to warm up to it...
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