Waller vs. Wildstorm #1: Capital is Coming

If there’s one thing that Amanda Waller craves, it’s control.

Throughout her history in the DC Universe, Amanda Waller has done her best to oversee every aspect of America’s safety and foreign interests through her metahuman teams, most notably, The Suicide Squad. She believes that she’s doing her best for the country and humanity by corralling these compelling people into her service and allowing them to die for continued freedom and influence, and that’s what makes this book such a treat to read. Spencer Ackerman and Evan Narcisse flex their knowledge of both the DC and Wildstorm Universes to weave an exciting superhero-espionage-thriller with Amanda Waller smack dab in the center as she takes over Checkmate and runs a unit that seems very much like Team 7 to kidnap superpowered beings and further her own goals through black ops.

What I like most about this book is that Ackerman and Narcisse frame the story through the lens of an investigative report by Lois Lane about a resistance group in the fictional nation of Gamorra at the end of the 1980s. This era was ripe to mine from as the US was still doing its best to curb the spread of communism and influence governmental structures in South America, emphasizing capitalism and having leaders they could reasonably control. This idea is even furthered with the introduction of Jackson King, the former leader of Stormwatch, who presents Lane with information about Checkmate’s upheaval and the rise of Amanda Waller. While King refuses to see how anything is more important than stopping Waller, Lane is written with her keen journalistic skills and connects dots that King’s idealist mind can’t wrap his head around – allowing this book to have an intelligent central character and a secondary lead with superpowers that will have to see his folly as the story rolls on.

Jesus Merino’s art perfectly balances the slow, methodical nature of the story and the brutal action that one might expect from a Wildstorm-centric book. Most of the story is told through long conversations, so characters often sit in medium shots that focus on their body language and facial expressions. Merino makes sure that each of these scenes is varied just enough to make the shot-reverse-shot formula enjoyable with small movements or inserts of either Lois taking notes and looking skeptical and King seeming remorseful or downright angry as readers are treated close up shots where Merino emphasizes his furrowed brows and tensed muscles. Not only that, but his backgrounds and establishing shots are so beautifully drawn and give he book a sense of life as we transition between environments and periods – from the skyline of Gamorra’s central city to Checkmate’s hidden outpost in the mountains of Afghanistan, Merino knows how to set a mood.

Where Merino’s art heats up is when he draws action scenes! His linework is ideally suited for these intense moments as they’re inked very thick to distinguish characters from their backgrounds and showcase highly dynamic action posing. When King storms the hidden Checkmate base and gets into a fight with one of his former Stormwatch teammates, Merino shows a bevy of energy blast attacks and characters going through walls as debris flies past them. Later on, in a set of pages without dialogue, Merino captures the carnage that Waller’s presumed Team 7 is capable of as Grifter, Deathstroke, Deathblow, John Lynch, and others massacre and burn a town to the ground. It’s a horrific and compelling set of pages ending with a bloody door reading “Yakarta Viene,” which threatened supposed communists hiding in small communities.

Mike Atiyeh’s colors perfectly capture the feel of the 80s in genuine and nostalgic ways. For the most part, the 80s was a bit of a conservative period, and Atiyeh conveys that through an overall filter of muted yellows and other earthy tones like browns or greens in the current time. Flashbacks also feel more down to earth as they lack the yellow but still aren’t saturated with the neon colors that everyone believes the time was full of, opting for more of a neutral grey-brown for the interior backgrounds. However, the nighttime establishing shots and Lois’ hotel room are given those more saturated color schemes with purple and blue lighting, respectively. The best use of color, however, definitely has to go to the Team 7 massacre and its use of bright oranges and deep reds where appropriate for fire and its lighting of the characters.

Finally, Dave Sharpe’s letters bring the story altogether. Because the book is very dialogue-heavy, it needed a letterer capable of balancing placement, word density, and excellent sound effects, and thankfully Sharpe was up to the task. He uses the space left by the artist for his word bubbles, and in the instances where there aren’t any, he improvises by placing them on characters so that they don’t obscure their actions or movements. He also ensures not to overwhelm readers with an intense amount of words in one bubble, making sub-bubbles as needed. And, of course, his use of sound effects is fantastic as he uses them often, from the FWOOOSH of King landing with his jet pack to the THOOM as he tosses his former teammate Winter through a wall. They amplify the feeling of these scenes and give them a sense of volume!