Tom King, one of the best screenwriters in the United States today, author of Marvel’s “The Vision” or the recent DC’s “Danger Street.”
Text: Manu González Illustration: Daniel Sampere and Jordie Bellaire
I think I have already told you about Tom King. Sorry if I can’t dig through my computer files, but I’m writing this in the middle of the Pyrenees mountains, on my wife’s laptop, and I don’t remember well. Let’s make a brief summary: 46-year-old American screenwriter who triumphed in the staple mainstream American with two series diametrically opposed in form and content. On the one hand, The vision for Marvel, accompanied by the Melilla native Gabriel Hernandez Waltatwelve issues that dealt with the reason for existence of artificial intelligence with surgical science fiction. Meanwhile, at the Vertigo label he met up with one of his best friends today, the cartoonist Mitch Geradsto make a noir on a topic he knew very well: post-war Iraq. Because King, apart from being a comic book writer, had been an officer in the CIA’s anti-terrorist unit, which he joined after the 9/11 attacks. In Iraq he experienced the unpleasantness of modern war as an update of the old colonialism of always. This disenchantment with the armed struggle can be seen in many of their stories such as The Omega Men, Mister Milagro, Strange Adventures or a fairly minor work, Heroes in crisisin which he addressed post-traumatic stress disorder in the figure of the greatest DC Comics superheroes. I’m going to say it without complexes, Tom King is the best screenwriter in the United States today. And it is for three main reasons: to introduce serious and current political issues in many of its series; a treatment of noir modern at the level of geniuses like Ed Brubakr and Greg Rucka; and, above all, knowing how to surround yourself with the best artists on the international scene, many of them Spanish.
After a long period with the Dark Knight and authors like Mikel JaninDC has given Diana Prince (Wonder Woman) a new relaunch of its superhero universe and King is accompanied by the Barcelona native Daniel Samperean artist with an anatomical knowledge and an elegance of energetic, spectacular and physical staging similar to that of geniuses such as Alan Davis either Bryan Hitch. There are Amazons from Themyscira Island living in the United States. When one of them murders nineteen men in a bar, the Government decides to expel all the Amazon migrants from the country, including one of its greatest heroes: Wonder Woman. The confrontation between the princess of Themyscira and the United States army is fast-paced and super fun to read, but King does not miss the opportunity to introduce hot topics in international politics, such as the fear of feminism and the misnamed cultural struggle. woke up turning the entire United States into a fat Dorito-eating INCEL locked in his mother’s basement. It’s a pity that the edition that ECC Ediciones has published of this comic is clearly insufficient, with quite serious printing errors.
Far from politics, but closer to noir that he likes so much and the revisionism of worn-out figures from DC’s superheroic pantheon, we have the recently finished Danger Street. With drawings of the always perfect Jorge Fornes (who already accompanied him in some issues of Batman and the maxiseries Rorschach), King collects some of the most forgotten DC figures created in the 1970s by geniuses like Jack Kirbythe true King of comics, Steve Ditko either Gerry Conway to tell us a comic story noir in the style of Coen brothers. In a lost town in the Midwest, a series of catastrophic events will end with the murder of an innocent man in a story involving characters like Starman, Warlord, Metamorpho, Creeper, Lady Cop, Manhunter and many more forgotten characters. The number of the fight between Manhunter and Assassin on the roof of a skyscraper is impressive. In the purest style William Goldman. Last October, ECC compiled all twelve issues into one volume.
#King #Librujula
