Static Shock 1 Thoughts


Writer: Scott McDaniel and John Rozum
Artist: Scott McDaniel

Despite the Scott McDaniel art, I was looking forward to this one, and it turned out much better than I'd hoped. I was actually quite the fan of Nightwing, but I hadn't seen McDaniel's style employed in the best way possible on a title. Until here.

Unlike the Static cartoon, this time Static Shock finds himself hanging out in New York City, having moved there from Dakota because of his parents. Considering DC's reader-friendly objective, the move was probably to simplify a character who used to exist inside of a completely different universe.

Virgil Hawkins feels like a modern Peter Parker--a genius teenage boy with superpowers. That's not a bad basis to work off, and fortunately the issue skips out on the main character having trouble adjusting in a new school, dealing with bullies and trying to ask out the cute girl he likes.

...While I'm sure some of that will come later, it's great that Rozum and McDaniel chose instead to open with a day in the life of Static Shock. We get a grasp of his powers, meet some brand-new villains, and get to see another famous MileStone character in an interesting role for this ongoing. (From what I understand, DC is doing it's best to put thought into how it incorporates all the stables of characters they've bought over the years in this new DCU, and so far so good. So long as they don't clutter things up again.)

I definitely enjoyed this first issue, and while I'm not necessarily completely in love with the comic it's definitely worth sticking around for issue #2, just to see how that cliffhanger plays out.

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