You Have No Alibi for Missing this One

By Joe Hilliard

For the second yea in a row, Top Cow is conducting its Pilot Season contest. This year, six new comic book titles vie for two spots as regular books in the Top Cow stable. Today, we'll take a look at one of those entries, Alibi, written by Joshua Hale Fialkov and drawn by Jeremy Haun.

Over the course of this column, we've taken a look at quite a few of Josh Fialkov's projects, from Elk’s Run to Punks. Both are brilliant comic books works. And they are about as different stylistically and visually from each other as any two comic books could be. Alibi continues in that vein, as Fialkov delves into the world of spies, covert operations and assassinations, all with a cynical smile on its face.

Alibi is the story of two brothers, John and Rick, assassins for hire. Similar to the Christian Bale character in The Prestige, they run a very simple, very elegant, system that allows them to be extremely successful in their profession. But that luck has just run out. Someone is onto them. Someone is out to end their career. Alibi is a cat-and-mouse chase that delivers. Fialkov builds up some good tension over the brief twenty-six pages, keeping both the characters and the readers on their toes. There are twists and turns down to the very bitter end of this hard candy, going from sweet to sour and back again. In many ways, it reminded me of Greg Rucka's Queen & Country, from the other side of the fence. John and Rick are annoyingly likeable, you like them, and yet you feel you really shouldn't. Their adversaries are confoundingly vague in their intentions. In other words, it dark and mysterious, and ends on an extreme note.

I wasn't too familiar with Jeremy Haun's artwork before. It's interesting; his pencil lines are very thin, delicate, which creates a photo-realistic feel to many of the pages while still maintaining that art feel. They certainly compliment the story well; this is a book that could have been marred by a more cartoonish take. The art is slyly humorous, although that may simply be me. John especially seems to have a twinkle in his eyes, as though breaking the third wall. That, and his resemblance to comic creator Steve Niles (at least to my eyes) kept an odd spin going throughout the book. I'd definitely look out for other books with Haun's art.

I liked Alibi a lot. This is a cliffhanger I want to see the next chapter to. Check it out for yourself. And, as they say, vote early and vote often. I have not checked out any of the other 2008 Pilot Season titles, but from the previews, Genius by Marc Bernardin, Adam Freeman, and Afua Richardson looks intriguing as well.

Alibi is on shelves now. Go buy it. Go vote for it. Joshua Fialkov's website: http://www.thefialkov.com. Jeremy Haun's website: http://www.jeremyhaun.com. The Top Cow Pilot Season myspace page: http://www.myspace.com/pilotseason.

Next time, an interview with creator Christopher Mills.

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