Written By: William Dickstein
Art By: Kamil Boettcher
Published By: Self Published
Note: Ch05En: Grizz Vol 2 is an indie release through Amazon.com. You can find the comic for purchase here.
Note: This review contains some plot spoilers.
When Ch05En: Grizz Vol 1 came out last year, I praised it for its interesting world, great art style, and its sheer force of will to exist. It was an indie comic that looked big-budget, and despite some writing flaws, was worth a read if you like super heroes. When William Dickstein sent me Vol 2, I was excited! Vol 1 had a great ending, and with some experience under his belt and Kamil Boettcher leading the artwork charge yet again, I imagined Vol 2 would be a real treat.
It is surprising then that Ch05En: Grizz Vol 2 is worse than Vol 1 in every way.
Let’s start with a little bit of background information. The Ch05En world is built like the X-Men one but with a twist: Everyone has the potential to become a mutant with super powers, not just a few freaks cursed with atypical genetics. This means that every person encountered has the potential to be very interesting and very dangerous. Grizz, meanwhile, is a Wolverine-styled Specian who operates on rage. At the end of Vol 1, he fled the superhero world with his lover Mische–who turned out to be a super villain–and together they’re looking to start life anew.
It all sounds interesting, right? By rights it should be. Vol 2 picks up right where Vol 1 left off, with a slew of superheroes after the defected Grizz and the super villain Mische, and then the whole thing kind of fizzles out into this bad fetch quest that goes nowhere and can’t stick to any single idea long enough to actually build agency.
Meanwhile, anything interesting these two characters had to offer has long sense fled. Mische plays at being shady, at maybe not being as reformed as Grizz thinks, but that never goes anywhere. Grizz, meanwhile, plays at being offended at what’s going on, at turning his back on the superhero world for love, but that also never goes anywhere.
(Well, not until the literal last page of the comic, which is the most undeserved character turn I’ve seen in some time.)
And hell, I might be okay with all of that under the right circumstances. Fine, Grizz and Mische are really this in love and they’re willing to do everything they can to stay together forever…except I don’t get that from the characters at all. Mische claims to be head-over-heels for Grizz to the point that he says, “My love” and “Darling” over 40 fucking times throughout the volume’s 80 pages, but we never actually see it. It’s tell over show to an obnoxious degree. Meanwhile, Grizz can’t manage to give even half a shit about the lover he’s changing his life for. His emotional range goes from apathetic to angry with no nuance in between.
At one point he’s asked to explain how he can justify what he’s doing, but he weasels out with a “Because I love him” before going back to being gruff.
Perhaps the worst part is, the comic leaves itself open to actually go further and explore these two characters and their dynamic. Grizz doesn’t want to do anything shady or villainous while Mische is willing to do whatever it takes to get his money. There’s so much room for character growth here, of the idea that, “My ex lover isn’t the man I knew him to be,” but it’s just never used. Grizz doesn’t want to bother with this quest; Mische does. Instead of Miche agreeing without asking Grizz’s opinion, the two go, “Can we have a moment?” and then have a nice chat about the positives and negatives of what they’re about to do.
It’s boring. The two are the central focus of the entire story, and there’s zero conflict between them.
The plot itself never elevates into more than its initial fetch quest, either. Each issue introduces something new that has the potential to be interesting, like the telepathic chick in #2, but once the issue is over, so is its idea. Telepathic chick hands over the dagger without a fight and we never hear from her again. It’s a shame too, because she has a cool design and an army of robots, and we never learn why.
This constant changing turns what should be a very straight-forward, character driven quest into a meandering mess of comic book tropes with zero payoff.
Hell, the stupid dagger doesn’t even do anything! I mean, it has some super powers for when the plot calls for it, but otherwise it’s just a Mcguffin. We also never learn why the telepathic chick even has the thing (unless Ghost is telling the truth, which is hard to believe).
I will give the comic credit for being so LGBT friendly though. Grizz and Mische are a pair of gruff, burly action heroes, and they’re so openly in a relationship that it’s kind of adorable. It would be like if Wolverine and Beast walked around holding hands and giggling at each other; it’s borderline over-the-top, but in an endearing way.
The artwork suffers along with the writing. I’ll stand by my praise for Vol 1, which had a wonderful style with kinetic fights that were fun to follow, but while Vol 2 keeps the style, the action sequences are more messy, and the in-between sections have more noticeable flaws. There are some distractingly-bad panels on display here, almost all of which involve someone trying to express joy.
Perhaps that’s why Grizz’s motivations are so hard to buy: His face just doesn’t lend itself to smiling without looking outright bad.
Listen, I was truly excited to give this comic a second chance. There’s a ton of potential to the world and the characters, but the potential and actual are night and day. You can give this one a pass.
