Echo: Volumes 1-3

Terry Moore is one of the few people in comics whose stuff I'll pick up on spec.  I went into withdrawal after he ended Strangers in Paradise a few years ago, and waited to pick up his new book, Echo, until he had a substantial amount of it out.  But I decided over the holidays that I couldn't wait any longer -- its run started in 2008 -- so I now have the first three trade paperback compilations: Moon Lake (2008), Atomic Dreams (2009), and Desert Run (2009), which between them cover issues #1-15 out of the 18 so far.  The issues and the compilations are all independently published by Moore under the imprint Abstract Studio.

Unlike SiP, which was often a bit surreal but essentially set in our own reality, Echo is science fiction.  Let me see what I can do to summarize without spoilers.

Julie Martin's life is quietly going to pieces: no job, no money, her husband divorcing her, and her sister in a mental hospital.  While out taking pictures in the desert, she witnesses a violent explosion in the sky above.  A rain of metal falls on her...and sticks.  Before long, a shiny silver breastplate grown from the metal rain is bonded to her body.  A nuclear research institute, hoping to get the pieces of their secret project back, hires the mysterious Ivy Raven, a sort of detective-bounty hunter-secret agent to locate Julie.  Meanwhile, she has made a friend in Dillon Murphy, whose girlfriend Annie was a scientist at the nuclear institute and heavily involved in the project before being terminated with extreme prejudice in the opening scenes of the story.  Julie and Dillon go on the run, discovering in the process that the metal suit has powers -- and perhaps a mind -- of its own.

The science is a bit on the handwavium side:

"I'd say we may have just created the thixotropic liquid of nuclear weaponry." 

"In English, Foster." 

"Silly putty." 

Yes, this is a book about some very aggressive and very shiny nuclear silly putty.  I can live with that.

Echo has some similarities to SiP: the heroine with a lousy life, the nearly superhuman huntress, the levels of conspiracy theories (centered around Moon Lake), having the heroine pursued by mysterious and powerful forces, and the usual Moore-stye wacky minor characters.  The art also has certain similaries to SiP in the faces and bodies of his female leads; Moore has a very recognizable style.  It's refreshing to see women with realistic bodies instead of standard superheroine hourglass caricatures.  That's one of the things that earns Moore hordes of female fans.

It's hard to judge the story when it's not yet complete, but so far I am pleased.  I can see where some of the plot is going, and I think the silly putty thing is more than just a throwaway joke.  But how Moore will resolve it all I've no idea.  I'm not even sure whether this is an open-ended series or whether it has a pre-determined length, and if so, what that might be.  Judging from SiP, it will all get incredibly convoluted before the end, though probably with less soap opera and, judging from the recent developments, more and gorier violence.

I'm not finding Echo as instantly addictive as I did SiP, but I'm perfectly happy to go along with Moore for another lengthy ride.  I like it quite enough to recommend it to anyone who'd be interested in a story that leavens its science fiction with interpersonal relationships and a bit of warped humor.

Shopping links for the first three compilations:

Comments

[Serge]

I've been reading "Echo" from the beginning and have enjoyed it from the word go, and I'm quite happy that, in spite of this being an independent comic-book, installments have been coming out pretty much once a month.

[Susan de Guardiola]

Did you read Strangers in Paradise as well?

[Serge]

Not yet, Susan, but I do have the first 3 volumes of the reprint paperback that came out last year.

Out of curiosity, do you read other comics? I don't think you do, but I want to make sure. I love the genre, but, amazingly, there are very few that I follow regularly. Maybe not so amazingly, because most of what I see out there just doesn't live up to its full potential. There are a couple of mainstream ones that I follow, but everything else is published by independents.

[Susan de Guardiola]

I don't read anything consistently since SiP ended (and I was reading that in the trade paperback editions rather than buying individual issues.) I just got a five-issue miniseries of Dracula that I am not terribly pleased with so far. Mostly I just back-collect older stuff that interests me. I liked Marvel before, but they managed to explode their universe so badly that I stopped reading it twenty years ago out of sheer irritation at constant alternate versions and crossovers and wars and reboots and all.

I do plan to get more of the Buffy continuation ("Season 8") comics once I finish watching the TV show.

[Serge]

I find that most of the comics I read are the one that remember that they are about Modern Mythology. For example, "Superman Returns" was very flawed, but it has a man who literally carries a world on his shoulders before falling back to Earth. I know, that's a movie, but... At the same time, while my preference is for larger-than-life-but-still-human comics, I don't mind those that poke fun at themselves: Atomic Robo had a monster from Out of Time take over Lovecraft in 1926, and come back in the 1970s, when it runs into Carl Sagan with a raygun.

[Susan de Guardiola]

That doesn't seem to fit with Echo, which is about a perfectly ordinary person. Even, maybe, a more-than-usually screwed up one.

[Serge]

True, Susan, but she has been put in an extraordinary situation. I should have referred to 'larger-than-life stories'.

[jonathan eigen]

Hi Susan, might I suggest Y the Last Man and Fables if you have not read them already.

[Serge]

I thought that "Strange Girl" was neat, although the ending felt rushed.

[Susan de Guardiola]

Serge,
I am pondering a theory in which ordinary people in extraordinary situations is fairy tale more than myth. Valid model? Hmm.

[Serge]

Susan... Interesting point. On the other hand, such situations have happened in the real world - for example during WW2. Of course, this may simply indicate that someone who always considered himself/herself ordinary turned out to be anything but. Hmmm... Maybe I should have started this response by asking what meanings you attach to those words, instead of assuming that I knew what you intended for them to mean.

Yes, I'm rambling.

[Serge]

In which category should one put comic-book stories of extraordinary people who, as they deal with extraordinary situations, discover a new self? Doctor Strange, for example...