ADVANCE REVIEW
PROOF #1
Writer: Alexander Grecian
Artist: Riley Rossmo
Inker: Riley Rossmo
Company: Image
I will admit that I don’t really care for Image Comics. Not that I have anything particularly against them, but I am really only into the Big Two (and even then, mostly Marvel).
Maybe I was wrong. This Proof is pretty good.
Proof concerns a group called The Lodge, or maybe they are just stationed at The Lodge, regardless, they keep an eye on all the creatures you thought were nonsense, poppycock and utter fabrication. Of course, this means that Proof is himself a Bigfoot; no, not Howard Stern’s Bigfoot, sadly (“I keepin’ a eye on the faeries, it isâ€). Proof has to break in a new partner, and look into some murders in Minnesota involving the Chupacabra.
The partner, Agent Ginger Brown, takes on the Murtaugh role and cribs the misunderstanding-leading-to-drawn-gun meeting straight from Lethal Weapon. Great…
The art I like. It is like Frank Miller meets Chris Bachalo; lots of heavy lines, and dirty, and imperfect. Rossmo also has a good handle on showing emotion and expression in his faces. When a character is upset or sharing a joke, you get it. There is lots of shadow, lots of darkness, and you can believe that the atmosphere in Washington State, where The Lodge is located, really is heavy and moist.
Grecian’s script keeps you turning pages, too. Proof’s relationship with his buddy Wayne is pretty jovial, and they’re very comfortable with one another. In fact, they could even be a little, y’know… Grecian’s also put a lot of effort into giving “Cryptoidsâ€, which provide mostly interesting facts (or maybe “factsâ€) about whatever is going on in the corresponding scene, like the old Pop-Up Video. The only problem with these Cryptoids is that sometimes they are interspersed with narration, so one can get confused and break the flow of the story, which does flow nicely.
Oh, and the nudity? It is very much like Courtney Love dying in The People Vs. Larry Flynt: it’s there, but there’s nothing sexual about it. If you clicked to find out about that, you have been had. Perv.
