The Power Fantasy, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Superhero

My writing has taken a serious hit in the past year or two as I have struggled with total and complete burn out. It has been around 6 years since I started talking and writing about one thing in particular, superhero comics. I have tried time and time again to rediscover my voice to write, or even talk, about the things I love in a constructive way but I worried that maybe that love had been taken from me. In my head, I cycled on the thought that maybe everything that I had been doing lately was a vapid attempt to recapture a love that had seeped from my heart. After a few years as an editor at a clickbait factory, I started to have a genuine fear that my love of superheroes had been killed.

If you’re reading this and scoffing under your breath then I ask you to hold in your cynicism for a bit. Superhero comics found a foothold in the public zeitgeist around the end of the Great Depression and the start of World War 2. Since then, they have been around in one form or another despite everything. I’m not going to give you a history lesson on comics but I want you, the reader, to understand that comics have been around to go through as many transformations as any other form of media. The idea of the superhero can be argued to be the logical next step of mythological characters but that’s something Grant Morrison covered.

As much as I love horror comics and every other genre that exists in the funny pages, what gets most people to pick up a comic is a character like Batman, Superman, or Spider-Man. It’s why I started reading comics. Comics have always been special for me because it’s a medium that I can retain because of some memory retention issues I have. Having art to go along with the words I’m reading, iconic artists whose styles define the worlds I am reading about, and unique dialogue writing have always been things that make it easier for me to commit a superhero comic to memory than any other comic or prose. There are certain things I do with comics that I just cannot do with other media because it just doesn’t work with how my brain is wired.

So having the feeling of losing that love has scared me. It’s so silly to type that now and read it here. I’m an adult. I have bills to pay. Should I be upset about this? No, I shouldn’t because there are incredible stories being told recently within the superhero genre that don’t rely on those crests and cowls that I had to mold into content countless times.

I have been telling myself that one day I was just going to kick the door in and get back to writing something. That one day soon I was going to read a superhero comic that I was going to enjoy so much that I didn’t feel that sucking empty void pulling me from sharing my words on the story. That’s The Power Fantasy for me.

When I first saw Kieron Gillen and Caspar Wijngaard talking about The Power Fantasy, my mind was instantly enthralled by the images they were sharing. Caspar is an artist whose work tractor-beams me to any project they’re attached to and this is no exception because he is working at godlike efficiency. Kieron, on the other hand, is an author who’s work I don’t feel like I have read enough of to ever say I understand the themes he likes to play with in his writing. I’ve read some of his wonderful Darth Vader work. But I do have some shame in not having had the chance to dig into his creator owned work, especially after reading this issue. Next time I’m at the comic store, I’m going on a Gillen shopping spree.

But when I saw those characters and the concept of The Power Fantasy, I told myself I was going to avoid everything about this series. I wanted to pick up the first issue and read it with no expectations other than the initial feeling that seeing those characters and the pitch pages gave me. There was something about it that was calling to me. The designs were so refreshing and I could look at them forever. I just had a feeling that this book would be special.

I am so happy I went in dark.

My review is spoiler-free but if I could urge you to stop reading here if you trust me as a credible source of what a good comic is…stop reading and pick up the book when it comes out on August 7th. 

But if you want to read a review of a truly spectacular piece of art, I have a lot of really phenomenal things to dig into moving forward. 

Gillen and Wijngaard have created a world with The Power Fantasy that draws you in like no other. Wijngaard’s mastery of color, design, and world-building get full reign over nearly every page of this issue. Gillen is setting up a political power-play superhero story unlike any other. Each bit of dialogue is perfectly situated by master letterer Clayton Cowles through the issue.

There are 6 superheroes on Earth. The continued existence of Earth relies on them never coming into conflict. When that concise two sentence summary can be your elevator selling pitch, you need to back it up with characters and dynamics that can carry it through the finish line. From the first page, we meet these “atomics” who are so uniquely distinct from one another. I want you to meet them on your own so I won’t go into detail here but will in an actual review come release. Wijngaard brings a superhero level flair to their outfits even when they are walking around in street clothes. The color choices of the clothing make them stand out on the page. Even when they aren’t relying on the typical tropes of capes, underwear, and such…you know you’re looking at a superhero.

The thing that turned me from a stranger to Gillen’s work to someone who is now ready to inhale any word he puts on a page is how he writes conversations and characters’ dialogue. I’ve never talked about this publicly but when I am reading a comic I want to work through and understand on a deeper level, I read the dialogue aloud. There is a conversation in the middle of the issue between Etienne and Brother Ray. Between how Gillen writes each characters unique way of speaking and Wijngaard’s character design, I was able to read their words with a distinct voice that just came from what I gathered about them from the brief interactions I was reading in the first issue. Many books take a few issues before characters find their voice but every single character in this issue is so distinctly themselves in every way. Every word flows naturally on the page and read aloud which isn’t always the truth for comics. There was never an issue following a very conversation heavy issue because of clear lettering from Cowles. It’s a testament to the writing being authentic and fully fleshed out, not just a pastiche of something else.

Every single piece of The Power Fantasy is a cog in a brilliant machine. There is a sequence later in the issue where you get a glimpse at the different atomics where Caspar Wijngaard and Gillen just get to show off. Gillen gets to show off how wildly different each of these super powered people is and how differently they have found their places in the world, it’s small slivers of foreshadowing on an orchestral scale. Wijngaard gets to show his ability to almost shift genre with his artistic styles and color of certain characters. One in particular takes on an almost religious horror iconography which has me chomping at the bit for more. It’s not even just the main character, even background characters are all stunning to look at. Some may come to play a larger role in the world with Brother Ray but people on the street all add to the scene by being done in a different color to highlight the importance of the atomics in a world where they stand apart.

There is a scene towards the end of the issue that I have reread a few times that sets the scale of the story that is going to unfold. It’s a scene that blew the flesh off my face with how impressive it was in story elements, writing, and art. I reread the scene with Dies Irae playing because it felt like the score I needed for what I was reading. There is a lot of meaning to the choice of the song which we will get into in my actual review. But for now, I suggest you hit play on the panel with the word “So…”

It’s been a long time since I’ve looked at the piece I have been writing about superheroes and been excited to put it out into the world. The Power Fantasy is the first serious superhero story that has put a cork in my heart to get me excited about superhero comics again. It’s not the typical superhero affair but it is something truly unique. It’s an absolute must-read comic for anyone, not just recovering clickbait editors.