A Righteous Thirst for Vengeance #1: Silence is Deadly

A Righteous Thirst for Vengeance may have a hard-boiled title like something out of an old-school John Woo movie, but its initial outing is anything other than that put to page. Quiet and deliberate, ominous and haunting, Vengeance movies forward like a mouse tip-toeing through snow, utilizing an almost-entirely silent script to build a narrative built entirely on mood and set pieces. It’s not an exaggeration to say this comic is about 75% silent panels – and in that way, it’s jarring at first. Longtime Rick Remender readers have a general idea of what to expect stylistically from the writer, but A Righteous Thirst for Vengeance couldn’t be further from his norm. Imagine a Tarantino movie mostly devoid of his trademark dialogue, and that’s the kind of stylistic shift at play here.

It’s tricky to pull off a silent script. It requires a tighter marriage than usual between writer and artist, because the writer can’t rely on dialogue to move the story forward. The net result is, in essence, a joint storyboarding exercise. And in that way, Remender and penciller Andre Lima Araujo succeed, to such a degree that this first issue’s protagonist doesn’t even have a name yet.

Unfortunately, Remender overcorrects in this regard. The Protagonist is such a cypher that it’s difficult to pin down why exactly we’re supposed to care about him. Remender and Lima Araujo work overtime to craft an easily-identifiable construction of everyman tropes: he’s a bit portly, has a bad habit of smoking, is kind to strangers, apologizes for being a jerk because he’s having a bad day, gets caught in the rain. He’s of some Asian descent (presumably Chinese-Canadian since part of the story takes place in Vancouver’s Chinatown, though it never explicitly states his origins), which creates both an outsider allure and also, coupled with the overwrought title of the comic, lends itself to overtures toward Hong Kong action flicks of yore that starred the likes of Chow Yun Fat and Donnie Yen and Tony Leung.

And maybe, Vengeance will eventually become that. Remender’s deliberate shift toward a visual, silent storytelling style for this comic would certainly lend itself to eventual all-out action. But for the first issue, there are just too many unknowns to create many reasons so care. Lima Araujo and Chris O’Halloran craft some generally alluring artwork; the former’s linework is smooth and unfussy but could have benefitted from a bit more detail. Absent that, it’s up to O’Halloran’s colors to carry the artistic weight, but his use of flats does the duo little favors. I realize this was a deliberate artistic choice, but it just didn’t grab me as a reader. The plus side is that they really are masters of sequential storytelling in a way that truly complemented Remender’s hushed script. Now if they can all bring it together, A Righteous Thirst for Vengeance may wind up being a pretty cool read in trade. But as it stands, the first issue simply leaves too much up in the air for readers to feel like they’ll want to come back for more. The premise is great and beautifully lean; I hope that Remender and Lima Araujo are able to eventually deliver on what’s hinted at in this first installment. I want to be all-in on this comic, but just don’t have enough to go on at this point to feel invested.