ULTIMATE HUMAN #1 by Warren Ellis, Cary Nord and Dave Stewart(2008).
© Marvel

Mania Grade: A-
Title: Ultimate Human
Issue: 1
Authors: Warren Ellis, Cary Nord, Dave Stewart
Publisher: Marvel
Price: $2.99

Related Links

0

Ultimate Human

Ultimate Human serves as a de facto follow-up to Mark Millar’s Ultimates 2, though it deals largely with Tony Stark – Iron Man – and the fugitive and presumed-dead Bruce Banner – the Hulk. Banner approaches Stark for help controlling his inner beast. The latter has access to nanotechnology that might control the physiological change that occurs when the mild-mannered Banner turns into the rampaging Hulk. Simon Wisdom – a mutated ex-MI6 spy who calls himself the Leader – wants the nanotech. Stark’s efforts to change Banner go horribly awry. Hulk smash.

Warren Ellis presents an issue that traffics largely in introduction and exposition, though based on the cover, one would almost think that a four-issue fight awaits the patient reader. I don’t know if it does, but Ellis manages to create a kind of ironic distance between the reader and the narrative through in-panel commentary that explains bits of the story. For instance, as Banner changes, he writes, “Bruce Banner weighs 120 pounds, and is five feet seven inches tall. Within two minutes, he becomes 1,200 pounds, and grows to a height of eight-and-a-half feet.” Much of the information Ellis conveys can’t be known without either a narrator or expository dialogue. In Ultimate Human #1, he provides little of either. Hence, though Ellis’s bits give the reader more information, they also highlight the limits of information conveyed by images alone. There’s always something going on that the picture can’t show. 

In the case of Simon Wisdom, the Ultimate Leader, we can see one of the great strengths of the Ultimate line. With so many characters still unused, it allows for a space more open to reinventing them. Obviously, no one has free reign at the House of Ideas, but retooling the Leader doesn’t require a grand act of retconning or a deal with the devil.

Cary Nord and Dave Stewart provide some amazing pencil-work and colors, respectively. The two always did a smash-up job on Dark Horse’s Conan, and they bring the same mixture of melancholy and majesty here. The grandiose and fantastic occurs around a cast of characters that never look less than utterly haunted. You’d think that everyone has a dark secret just by looking at them, and in the case of Ultimate Human, most of them do. Pick this one up.

Questions? Comments? Let us know what you think at cinescape@mania.com.