Comic Review: Plutona #1

• Story by Jeff Lemire and Emi Lenox
• Script by Jeff Lemire
• Art by Emi Lenox
• Colors by Jordie Bellaire
• Letters by Steve Wands
• Published by Image Comics

Plutona is being sold as a comic about superheroes, but it's really only about it using a wide definition of the term. There are superheroes in the world, and they interact with the story, but they're not the main thing that it's about. In the end, none of that really matters, as it's in the areas other than basic premise that this story sticks out.

Instead of the superheroes, we follow wretched, terrible people that make supervillains cringe: middle school students. Mie seems to be the main character, and we're mostly following her throughout the day with her brother and friends. She treats her brother terribly, but there's also Diane, her best friend who she treats even worse, and for the most part, it's really just going through their daily life.

It's hard to talk about this issue without talking about the end, since this issue is mostly setup for the last couple pages, where the story will really start later. This isn't as much of a problem as I normally have with this structure, since most of the comic was so low key that I didn't really expect anything big to happen, just spend time with these characters. Without spoiling too much, the superheroes of this world are a cross between the police and reality TV stars, and Mike, Mie's younger brother, really likes following them. By the end of the issue, they run straight into dealing with the heroes directly.

This issue embraces the all too rare simplicity that is possible in comic art. It sets a great tone for the book that I can't really put into words, but that's why they use art for it instead. By keeping it simple, they allow the characters to show a lot of emotion and facial expressions that just works really well for the story, nothing more complicated than that.

This comic isn't great yet, but it is off to a good start. Given enough time, it could probably become great, and what's in this issue is enough for me to want to come back to it next issue.