Echo: Volume 4: Collider

I made a comics store run right before the long weekend and picked up the latest Echo compilation, Echo Volume 4: Collider (Abstract Studio Comics, 2010), which collects issues #16-20.  I enjoyed the first three Echo compilations (here), but as the story picks up speed my interest is rapidly increasing.

Note: spoilers below for Volumes 1-3, but I think I've avoided any for Volume 4.

When Echo Volume 3: Desert Run ended, Julie Martin was on the run with her sister Pam (left gently insane after her husband and children were killed in a car accident) and her new friend Dillon, who has realized that something of his dead girlfriend Annie Trotter, a brilliant scientist, remains in Julie via the remains of Annie's nuclear-powered metal suit, which have attached themselves permanently to Julie's body.  The mysterious special agent Ivy Raven, formerly hunting Julie and Dillon for the evil masterminds of the nuclear research institute HENRI, had just blown away a HENRI scientist carrying his newly-invented "proton gun," the only weapon made that will have any impact on Julie's suit (fatally, for Julie) and was covering their escape amid gunfire and explosions.

Collider opens with the escape apparently having been successful, as Julie and Pam are now on Ivy's private plane, flying back to her home, where she hopes the healing powers of Julie's suit can help her young daughter, Lulu, who was left deaf after a serious illness earlier in the series.  Ivy has come fully over to the good guys' side now, replaced as the lead hunter by a nameless man who efficiently slaughters witnesses and "cleans" crime scenes.  Meanwhile, the scientist who invented the proton gun is being kept alive on life-support while HENRI agent Jack Cooper pressures him to reveal the secret to its construction.  We learn a lot more about HENRI, Annie, and the mysterious Phi Project in this volume, both from the bad guys and from Dillon and his bartender friend Dan's conversation with Annie's devastated co-worker Will, an idealistic and unworldly scientist who is shocked at the uses to which HENRI is putting Annie's work.  Dan is an interesting character: a hulking Air Force veteran who now runs a bar frequented by survivalist bikers.  He and his biker buddies have been helping Dillon and Julie since early in the book's run.

The science is a little over my head -- I was entirely in sympathy with Dillon when he cut off Will's lengthy technical explanation of the Phi Project by asking for the "action movie version" -- but it seems to be based on the idea that using base 10 mathematics only produces an approximate model of the universe.  If all mathematics is recalculated using Phi as the base then the secrets of the universe will be revealed.  Or, um, something.  This is not entirely handwavium: Phi is the real-world term for the irrational number 1.1618..., also known as the Golden Ratio, a concept familiar to mathematicians since ancient Greece and the aesthetic basis for many works of art and architecture including, notably, the Parthenon.  Hence the Phi Project.  This new math was the basis for Annie's work, which produced the suit, which, in its current nuclear-silly-putty form, appears to have both healing powers and some sort of remnant or imprint or psychic connection to Annie. 

Unfortunately, the same work can also be used in some pretty nasty and potentially world-ending ways, and HENRI and the Phi Project folks still want the suit back, which means capturing Julie.  They also want no information leaks, which means the body count climbs rapidly in this book.

As Moore starts tying his story together it's becoming increasingly intense and increasingly gripping.  I'm much more enthusiastic about Echo after reading Collider than I was after the first three volumes.  And I'm not the only one taking notice: Moore is up for several comics-specific awards, including the Eisner.  I'm still not entirely clear on whether Echo is a single story arc that will end in the near future, which is what it seems to be building to, or an open-ended book.  If it's a single-arc series, it may well turn up on my Hugo nominee list once the whole thing is complete.  But even if it's open-ended, I have sufficient faith in Moore to be fairly confident it won't just turn into random "adventures of the girl in the nuclear silly putty suit" thing once the current story arc ends.

At this point, I think I can highly recommend Echo.  Shopping links for the previous volumes are in my earlier post.  Amazon doesn't seem to be carrying Collider yet for some unexplained reason, but I'll update with a shopping link when it does.  In the meantime, the only places to get it seem to be your local comics store and Terry Moore's website, where you can order it directly from the Echo online store.

I can't wait to see what happens next.

Comments

[Serge]

The only criticism I'd make is that the only non-white character is a Chinese who turns out to be treacherous.

[Susan de Guardiola]

Yeah, there's some ethnic stereotyping there: brilliant but treacherous Asian. And the only two obviously gay people are (1) a flaming poofter -- okay, a flaming poofter survivalist biker dude, which is not exactly fitting the stereotype -- and (2) a bad guy. Although I'm having some little gaydar pings about Ivy and am starting to really wonder what's in Julie's infamous secret box that makes her husband think she's a pervert and makes Ivy smirk. Lesbian porn and a vibrator?

[Serge]

Susan... You wait until the compilations are out to read "Echo", right? You'll soon find out about your gaydar's pinging.

[Serge]

As for what was in the box... I have no idea what might in it that Julie's ex would have had such a reaction. Personally, I hope we never find out because revelations all too often tend to be disappointing, compared to the vague ideas floating around in our imagination - for example, how and why Wolverine got his claws in the movie version.

[Susan de Guardiola]

Yes, I'm waiting for the compilations. So please don't post spoilers or drop hints.

[Marilee J. Layman]

I have a small vibrator for hands. The "handle" is way too small for the normal use, you just use the top pineapple-shaped vibrator. This works well with my arthritis and gout, but back when I used it at work just because my fingers got cold, the guys all made jokes.

[Serge]

Marilee... Didn't the pineapple-shaped vibrator give them feelings of inadequacy?

[Serge]

Speaking of feelings of inadequacy...

[Marilee J. Layman]

LOL I think they just thought it was odd. And I'd made them take porn off the walls!

[Susan de Guardiola]

Serge:
If you keep posting hints about future issues -- which I clearly said above not to do -- I'm going to keep deleting them.

[Serge]

I know you did, but the quote didn't give the context. Since you considered that enough to be a hint, I shall refrain from making any reference from now on. My apologies.