Joshua Hale Fialkov

Though I have been a reader of comic books since the 1980s, my enjoyment of them in the past few years has been infrequent. While I miss out on a lot because of this, the silver lining is that when I DO pick up a comic book or a graphic novel it has the ability to be a lot more surprising to me. This helps to explain why I enjoyed the collection as much as I did, as I was experienced Reed Richards the megalomaniacal villain for the first time. It's quite a logical development for a character show more who has often been high-handed and manipulative even in the regular FF run, and that he sees himself as being so for altruistic reasons only highlights the costs of his actions.

Of course, this is an Ultimates title, and not an FF one; Reed even isn't the main villain (that would be the Ultimates version of Kang, which as with many of the best Ultimates characters is depicted with a twist). Joshua Fialkov starts things out abruptly, as events go from calm to crisis in just the first three pages. Once the pace is set Fialkov doesn't let up, keeping events going at a rapid pace). What drives events isn't really the plot (which is ill-defined even by the end) but an entertaining intellectual pissing contest between Reed Richards and Tony Stark, which is just the sort of thing that two arrogantly brilliant adversaries would obsess over (the more noble depiction of Richards in the regular FF series is what prevents such exchanges taking place there between him and the oddly insecure Doctor Doom). The verbal and intellectual sparring between the two makes for a highly entertaining conflict, one that I hope to see again the next time I pick up future collections in the series. show less

I loved it for riffing on Casablanca and building a Who story in the interstices. Didn't love the art style, though

Library copy.

My quest to find a new graphic novel series to love continues! This time I decided to give The Bunker: Volume 1 a shot at catching my interest. See, the premise is what struck me. 5 friends who find letters from their future selves in a mysterious bunker. Letters that promise them they can change the fate of the world. They'd chosen wrong the first time, and the entire population of Earth had suffered. I wondered, would they do the "right" thing? I love stories where there's a thin line show more between right and wrong. I was so hoping for one of those.

I almost gave this up after reading the first page, simply because the dialogue bubbles in the first issue are horribly rendered for digital reading. I genuinely hope they fix this if they're going to sell digital copies but, as I had an ARC, I soldiered on. What was laid out before me was a story that slowly pieced itself together. The story line is a little choppy, which I guess is to be expected if you're looking at a series of events from 5 different points of view. Still, it doesn't make for the easiest read in the world. I constantly had to reorient myself to understand whose head I was in.

Which brings me to another issue I had, and that was the illustrations. I didn't dislike them entirely, but I was overly impressed either. The characters are inked onto the page in a way that makes them look gritty and unfinished. Almost as if they are in constant fluctuation. If this was the effect the illustrator was going for, they succeeded. The problem is that it makes the characters rather hard to distinguish between. My saving grace was that one man and one woman have glasses, and one of the other male characters is on the larger side. Again, I had to stop and reorient myself to who I was following in the panels each time they swapped.

There are, of course, underlying stories to each of these characters. Since this volume only compiles the first 4 issues, the reader only skims the surface of a few of them. I think this was my favorite part of The Bunker: Volume 1. I enjoyed getting to know each of these characters on a more visceral level, and I have a definite feeling that their backgrounds are going to be very important in the issues to come. This story is as much a coming-of-age story as it is a science fiction romp. Thus I can admit, I'm still intrigued.

So I'll happily give three stars to this first volume, and promise to be back for more. I'm hoping all the problems are resolved in the volumes to come, and that I can add this series to my "must haves" list. show less

The Bunker: Volume 1 by Joshua Hale Fialkov centers on a group of five friends who go to the forest to bury a time capsule. As they're digging around they stumble instead on a bunker and discover four letters addressed to four of them. (Interestingly, one guy doesn't get his own letter, a telling detail that will play itself out later in the arc of the story.) At first they think it's all an elaborate joke. They soon realize that it is all very real. The handwriting and the information show more mentioned in each letter remove all doubts. Tellingly, they don't share the letters with each other.

The messages in the letters are grim. In one form or another they learn that the world is going to end; an epidemic will eventually wipe out most of humanity. A few of them learn that they play a role in bringing about this disaster. The revelation disrupts the dynamics in the group and everyone starts to drift apart. The storytelling shifts at this stage, and we start to learn about each character individually.

Visually, The Bunker captures the tension between past, present, and future with panels that mix a heavy cocktail of pathos, regret, and unresolved personal sh*t that comes to the surface. This story is very character-driven and we're treated to backstories alongside both an increasingly anxious and paranoid present and flash forwards to a terrifying future. Good stuff. I thought the characters were very distinctly portrayed both through the dialogue, the letters, and the pacing of the panels.

A lot of people have expressed their distaste toward the artwork. Joe Infurnari's style here is abstract, blurry, as if we're looking at unfinished sketches, but I think this deliberate 'messiness' contributes nicely to the dark mood and evokes the shifting temporality inherent in the story. I think the criticism is unduly harsh. Illustrations don't have to be pretty.

The Bunker starts with a discovery and ends with a pretty big cliffhanger *SPOILER AHEAD as one of the future 'selves' returns to the present to confront (and manipulate?) the group*. As far as comics-style storytelling goes, this is compelling. I definitely want to read Volume 2. show less