Blue Beetle #10: Letting the Art Talk

The action is wall to wall in a showdown between Jaime and Pinnacle. But this isn’t just a mindless action set piece. Trujillo tries to slip in an emotional coda to events from several issues earlier. The creative team swings for the fences in Blue Beetle #10.

Jaime arrives at Brenda’s crash site in Blue Beetle #10’s opening pages. There’s little he can do that paramedics can’t. But Brenda does warn him about Pinnacle, who is now as big as a small skyscraper. Pinnacle is marching toward the Horizon, intent on wiping out anything not from Earth. Jaime engages him in battle. The Horizon join in. But the only hope for Jaime’s victory lies with Ted and Victoria. And even if he can stop Pinnacle, what should be down with the corrupted beetle at its heart?

Blue Beetle #10 is the series’ most action oriented issue to date, and Gutiérrez steals the show. He doesn’t carry the issue in the sense that it’s only good because of his work. Instead, Trujillo demonstrates that he knows when dialogue is truly needed as opposed to merely pointing out the obvious. The final panel on the first page shows Jaime hunched over, tightly cringing, with small curved lines just above his body anywhere it’s bent (elbows, wrists, etc.). This is the only response we see from him regarding Brenda’s condition, and it conveys everything it needs to. Trujillo doesn’t need to add dialogue or internal monologue where Jaime expresses what he feels in words. One image communicates the emotion, and it informs everything that follows.

A few pages later, when Jaime attacks Pinnacle, there’s no need for commentary about how big he is. The first two panels in their encounter establish the relative size of each character. Jaime is the size of one of Pinnacle’s eyes. Once again, no text is necessary to establish the perfectly obvious because Gutiérrez conveys the information.

Comics that do what Blue Beetle #10 does showcase the collaboration between writer and artist. Trujillo doesn’t need to overwrite the issue because Gutiérrez is able to communicate key story and character information on his own. Going back to Blue Beetle: Graduation Day, this creative team has demonstrated how every member is truly additive. They each lift each other. That is on display even more here with Trujillo and Gutiérrez.

This issue’s true emotional core comes in the final pages. Blue Beetle #10 offers unexpected resolution to the critical event in Blue Beetle #6 when Khaji, against Jaime’s instructions, kills Kha-Ef-Re. That event was addressed in the following issue via a pep talk from Jaime’s mom, and it was sufficient enough that there was never the sense that it was unresolved. But the final pages in this issue call back emotionally to Kha-Ef-Re’s death and communicate the idea that both Jaime and Khaji have carried the trauma from that event with them and have come out the other side to face an opportunity to heal.

Seeing the Horizon refugees get in on the attack against Pinnacle is a nice touch. If the Horizon refugees are a metaphor for real world immigration systems and the situation immigrants can find themselves in, this provides a hopeful note. Though they are aided by Xiomara/Dynastes, the Horizon do stand and fight. They do not need to be sheltered as though they are helpless. And teaming them with one Palmera City’s protectors highlights the idea of unity in this experience.

Several of the early panels in the Jaime/Pinnacle fight sequence are handled entirely with colors rather than detailed art. The aforementioned panel showing off Jaime’s emotional response to Brenda’s condition after her crash is done with Jaime in solid light blue with no detail against a completely dark blue background. Gutiérrez does capture the powerful emotion with what is essentially an outline of Jaime, but the contrast in the colors Quintana chooses feel like an additional physical impact on the character.

The fight between Jaime and Pinnacle is largely one of two characters blasting each other with powerful bursts and beams of energy. Gattoni gives these energy exchanges heft with exaggerated sound effects, both in size and color. They work particularly well in those panels that are merely outlined characters defined by color contrast rather than detailed art (similar to the panel described above).