Wetworks is the latest beneficiary of WildStorm's "turn back the clock and hope for the best" relaunch strategy.

The original incarnation came out through Image back in the nineties, and largely passed me by.  I gather it was cyborgs versus vampires, which at least has a certain over the top appeal to it.  This time round, WildStorm have paired artist Whilce Portacio, who created the book in the first place, with current X-Men writer Mike Carey.

In theory, this doesn't sound so bad.  Carey is a solid action writer when he wants to be.  Portacio has never exactly been to my taste - even in his early days, his work was scratchy, and his brief run on X-Force was frankly indefensible.  But hey, at least he's usually comprehensible, and Carey is fairly reliable.  So it's worth a look, right?

Wrong.

The problem is not the art.  True, the art is ropey.  There are a couple of points where I was genuinely uncertain whether I was still looking at the same character as the previous panel.  The character design for lead character Dane is ugly beyond belief.  But for the most part, you can follow it, and it functions.

No, the problem is the writing.  As a set-up issue, this is a total mess.  Characters from the previous series are wheeled on without explanation.  The premise is taken for granted with no attempt to tell us what it is.  Near the end of the book, somebody throws in the information that there's a truce with the vampire king in effect.  Not only is this the first mention that the vampire villains must be rebels of some sort, it's the first really clear indication that this is a comic about heroes who fight vampires.  Which is pretty important, considering that the villains are vampires.  There's a lot of generic tough guy dialogue, and the overall impression is of Carey attempting an all-too-successful imitation of the sort of writing Image used to do in their mid-nineties nadir.

I don't know what's gone wrong here.  The story concept is passable, but the actual story is a mess.  This isn't just bad - it's bad in a way I would never have thought possible from Mike Carey, who clearly knows all the fundamentals that are so blatantly absent here.  Elementary failures of exposition, unconvincing characters, choppy pacing, no flow... did Carey really write this?  I suppose he must have, but it's a concept I'm really struggling to wrap my head around.  There's a passable story concept in here struggling to get out, but that's about all that can be said for it.

Those who actually like Portacio's art may at least get something out of the visuals, which have everything you'd expect from him.  But it does nothing for me, and the result is a baffling, and unexpectedly off-target comic. 

Rating: C-

back | continue