Rifters #6 // Review
Fenton and Geller are being attacked. there's a lot of shouting going on. There's a lot of punches being attempted. Cybernetics may be involved. Just a normal day at the office for a couple of guys who are about to get very, very messy in Rifters #6. The writing team of Brian Posehn and Joe Trohman continue a fun absurdist action fantasy with artist Chris Johnson and colorist Mark Englert. Though the plot is actually pretty weak, the creative team manages to generate a great deal of charm in the crazy, chaotic rush of events that Fenton and Gellar have to jump through to get fro the front cover to the back cover of another interesting issue.
They're able to evade any direct injury initially. Of course, they're only up against one person. And she may be an absurdly formidable fighter but she's only one person. Of course, when everybody else shows up they're going to have to find a way out. And that way is going to involve crawling through disgusting and encountering people that they would prefer not to have to deal with. At least they bought themselves some. At least they're not dead. Yet.
Posehn and Trohman quite a bit of momentum just by shooting the two characters through the plot as quickly as possible. There is ample time of for a little bit of well defined action here and there. But for the most part, the issue gains most of its appeal momentum. It also helps that the dialogue isn't quite as awkward as it had been in the first few issues of the series. The rating team has done a better job of keeping attempts at comedy to a minimum. As a result, the script feels a little bit more self-assured. the issues seem so desperate to be funny. It's a lot better when they're just relaxing and telling the story. They don't have to try so hard. Really. It's just annoying.
Johnson's rendering continues to be very appealing. The stiffness of some of the action of the earlier issues it seems to have largely out of page and panel. There are some rather nice angles being taken on the action. There's a fluid sense of movement and motion. Some of the framing is brilliant and subtle with respect to the comedy. Englert he is given plenty of room to define mood and motion and illumination in very vivid and enjoyable colors.
It's nice to see the series settling into the kind of rhythm and motion that could make it almost live up to its potential. It's not doing so, of course. But it looks like it's actually actually going in a interaction where it could. It's just a matter of making a few adjustments here and there and the series could get really interesting really quickly. There is so much potential and this kind of time travel and weird office politics and strange, cyberpunk atmosphere. A few more issues like the latest and Rifters could really turn into something.
