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Hard
Time #1
1/APRIL/2004
Publisher: DC Comics/Focus
Writer: Steve Gerber
Pencils: Brian Hurtt
Inks: Brian Hurtt
Colors: Brian Haberlin
Letters: Jared K. Fletcher
Price: $2.50 US/R26.00 SA
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DC started its Focus line of comics a few months
back. With a leaning towards ‘Superhuman’ events/powers
happening to normal people rather than a spotlight on Superheroes,
this line of comics promises some original and interesting stories.
Hard Time is one of four initial releases for the
Focus line, the other three being Fraction, Kinetic
and Touch.
Two high school losers/nerds decide to play a joke on the jocks
who belittle them by taking their high school hostage.
Five fatalities and countless injuries later only one of the two
hostage takers survives. Fifteen year old Ethan Harrow is found
guilty on all counts even though he never fired a shot. With a
strange supernatural power that he manifested and which
led to his fellow hostage taker and friends death, who was truly
responsible for the murders, how will Ethan survive his fifty year
jail sentence?
Steve Gerber [Superman: Last Son of Earth]
writes a story driven by ‘current’ events in America.
Littered with references to the Columbine tragedy
and showing all facets of the American media machine from Opera
through to Dr.Phil, this book can be annoyingly centered on the
‘American Experience’. The story at
the heart of the book only truly starts to separate itself from
this ‘re-written’ Columbine rip-off within the last
few pages of this issue. It’s a shame Gerber couldn’t
have come up with something more original to start his story with,
because the premise at the heart of it is a good one. It looks like
this book will only start to blossom once Gerber gets a chance to
write about his central characters life on the inside. Let’s
hope he can give it enough of a special twist to remove it from
the ‘OZ but with superpowers’ category
it’s been labeled under.
The artwork by Brian Hurtt is not particularly
suited to the serious tone of this book. His style is too vibrant
and cartoon-like in form and just doesn’t seem to gel with
the topics at hand. In places his characters look slightly out of
perspective and the overall feel of the art is too light and happy
in nature.
The colors however help to save Hurtt’s art from being completely
out of place. Brian Haberlin uses blue tones muted
together with soft grays and offset by vibrant reds and pinks to
give this book a highly distinctive look. This
immediately helps to distinguish it from the normal superhero fare
and shows a new direction visually for the Focus books. It’s
interesting to notice that Haberlin is the colorist for all four
of these initial Focus books. An interesting editorial choice seems
to have been made in order to keep an underlying theme/link going
in these initial series. This is all good as long as Haberlin can
keep up his schedule.
These interesting and energetic choices with color seem to have
been made to make these books different to other on the stands and
it’s exciting to see one of the Big Two [Marvel,
DC] trying something new. The covers for these
series are equally experimental and have their own spark that makes
them stand out from the norm.
A standard first issue due to the copycat style
of the catalyst ‘High School Shooting’ event written
by Gerber. Interesting coloring even though the artwork feels misplaced
for the story at hand.
Score 5/10
Reviewed By:Iain Duncan
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