Lawful #1: Strictly Informative

“Rules are made to be broken,” the saying goes. Whoever coined that saying wouldn’t last long in the city featured in Lawful. Breaking the rules in this society has serious consequences. Lawful #1 seeks to entice readers with a fascinating world, intriguing characters, and issues relevant to today’s society.

Lawful #1 begins with two young friends, Eris and Sung, throwing rocks into a river instead of disposing of them properly. The activity lures a monster to leap out of the water and over the city’s wall. The monster is successfully fought off by a champion, but breaking the rule has made Sung grow thick red scales on the center of his chest. In this city, breaking rules causes people’s bodies to slowly transform into monsters themselves. Thirteen years later, Sung pursues a position in the Office of the Champion–the group charged with enforcing the city’s rules. Achieving the position would be an honor. But it might also mean standing in judgment over his rule-breaking friend Eris.

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter is a rebuke to Puritanical society and radical abolitionists. The extreme legalism of the society Hester Prynne lives in results in her being marked and shunned for the sin of adultery. The book does not argue that adultery is not a sin but that the Puritanical leaders are not capable of discerning appropriate punishments.

Similar themes run deep in Lawful #1, but Pak takes them to an extreme degree. Breaking any rule results in some kind of physical marking that everyone can see as well as being shunned by society (via eventual exile). LIke The Scarlet Letter, there seems to be no thought to the proportion of punishment relative to rule breaking. While Lawful #1 does not explain how this system came to be, it does introduce a monk-like group that is responsible for exiling citizens. The net effect is that this society is controlled to a degree even beyond that of the Puritans, and it reflects modern day concerns of putting people in power who enforce their own moral beliefs on an entire population.

The relationship between Sung and Eris is an effective way to explore this dynamic. The comic reveals more about Sung than Eris, and it sets him up to give the reader a look at the order that enforces the rules in the city. He’s a complex character whose fastidious rule following plays against loyalty to his friend.

Lawful #1 offers a couple pages of action to start the issue but otherwise it tracks Sung the day before and the day of his test. He’s a reserved character. His dialogue isn’t very revealing. Selling his emotional state largely comes down to Galindo’s art. For as devoted as Sung appears to be to the Office of the Champions, Galindo constantly draws him with his head down, his eyes on the ground, and a frown on his face. The internal conflict that becomes obvious by the end of the issue is foreshadowed almost from the beginning by Sung’s appearance. Does he really want the life he’s preparing himself for? Pak’s dialogue says “yes” even as Galindo’s art suggests otherwise. The juxtaposition creates that all too familiar human behavior of saying one thing while meaning another.

The city’s appearance feels almost deceptive. The society isn’t presented as dystopian, but its strictly enforced rules and publicly visible punishment are certainly undesirable. Neither Galindo nor Kniivila reflect that in the city’s depiction, though. The streets are clean. The buildings are well cared for. Lush trees line the streets. The sky is bright. And despite being marked by horns or animal features, the city’s population is depicted as happy. From a visual standpoint, the city is a wonderful place to live–the kind of society promised by would-be leaders who desire strict control of the people at the expense of their freedom.

Lawful #1 opens with a wide look at the city from a distance and perhaps the most important piece of dialogue in the entire issue. A dialogue bubble points down to where Sung and Eris are seen in the following panel. The bubble sits almost dead center above the city and is filled with only one word: DON’T, in red colored letters. The bubble’s size is just right for the panel as is its location. Bowland more or less describes the city’s mission statement in the first panel.