Quick Rating: All Right
Title: Moonday

Moonday? Is that a riot or what?

Writer: Peter Hogan
Pencils: Chris Sprouse
Inks: Karl Story & John Dell
Colors: Dave Stewart
Letters: Todd Klein
Editor: Scott Dunbier
Assistant Editor: Kristy Quinn

I’ve heard it said that you could judge a great song because it still sounds great no matter who sings it. Somewhere I have a recording of Debbie Harry and Iggy Pop doing Cole Porter’s Well Did You Evah? which demonstrates this point. It’s a great song that shines even through their rough edges. I don’t know if this evaluation is analogous for fictional characters. For the most part, Sherlock Holmes has survived a lot of authors. Tarzan has suffered a bit more. Comic book superheroes seem to fall into the Tarzan category. More often than not, they provide shorthand for what the current author is trying to signify. Tarzan represents the triumph of the modern man over his environment. Spiderman is the struggle with responsibility. The X-men are victims of prejudice. Without these brief sketches, it can be difficult to tell what an author is getting at in a story. I think Tom Strong may signify other superheroes or the power of superheroes or superhero comics or…. I wish I knew because this one-off tale just does not have much meat on it.

Tom Strong has volunteered to help rescue the friend of a friend who has gotten lost on the moon. The story opens on the moon in the middle of the search. I’ll avoid telling you what they find, but the tale ends with the search complete and the whole party going home. In the great arc of Tom Strong tales, we are left with one titillating possibility and nothing much else.

Despite its profusion in the past century, narrative art does not get much respect in the art world. So, is it fair to compare comic book artists to old masters? If you live near Boston, you should run to the Museum of Fine Arts and see their Rembrandt show. It’s filled with comic book panels. If he lived now, he’d be the king of European comics. Styles evolve and change. The criteria remain the same. Does the piece of narrative art communicate the information that it is meant to convey? Does it do so in an interesting, entertaining, artful way?

In comics, the art can struggle with the information. Sometimes there is too much to convey. In Moonday, there is too little. The tale moves at a glacial pace. This is the sort of story that Scooby Doo tells in four pages. I’m all for stories that set a mood and build from there. But that is not what is going on here. I like the art in Tom Strong usually, but I can’t point you to something that really thrills me in this issue.

I don’t know about you, but I’m so looking forward to Saturnday. But what story name will they come up with based on that big ball of gas at the center of our solar system? In the America’s Best pantheon, I really miss Tomorrow Stories and Top 10, but I don’t know if I would miss Tom Strong to quite the same degree. I hope they come up with an issue soon that makes me feel like a new reader can jump on and run with it.

October 2003