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Whiteout
Trade paperback by Oni Press
Review
by : Troy
Brownfield
Creator:
Greg
Rucka
Official Site: www.onipress.com
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Greg
Rucka knows crime. He’s a novelist that made the backward
transition into comics. Currently plying his trade as the
regular writer of DC’s Detective Comics, Rucka has breathed
a tough-minded sensibility into that title and placing it
at the top of the Batman family.
As
good as Detective is, Whiteout is better. A sometimes brutal,
claustrophobic tale, Whiteout stuns you with sharply defined
characters and an intelligence far superior to run-of-the-mill
crime fare. What’s wholly remarkable is that Rucka has taken
the conventional murder mystery and set it at a snow-base
in Antarctica. Imagine the loneliness and isolation; now imagine
that a murderer may be there with you. Rucka builds this idea
with eerie precision.
While
Rucka’s writing alone might be enough to support a book, we
don’t have to find out. Steve Lieber’s magnificent art beautifully
renders the bleak despair of the Antarctic setting. It must
be incredibly difficult to shape huge areas of white space
into something that carries meaning, but Lieber’s visuals
astound page after page. You can almost feel the cold. He’s
like the negative version of Frank Miller’s Sin City (who
incidentally contributes the cover).
If
the setting, mood and atmosphere weren’t already startling,
then Rucka and Lieber completely throw out convention by giving
us two strong female protagonists as our heroes. Marshall
Carrie Stetko and Lily Sharpe are as fully realized as any
two comics characters in recent memory. With subtle shadings
from both writer and artist, we feel for their plight and
get drawn right into their story. It’s refreshing to see two
women so active and written so well.
I
hate to unveil any aspects of a carefully constructed mystery,
so I won’t. The story is there for you to enjoy on your own
terms. And I absolutely urge you to do so. This collection
hasn’t won a laundry list of awards for nothing; it’s bracingly
original and a vigorously different kind of comics story.
Don’t be left out in the cold.
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