3 out of 5

First Bad Dog is completed after a bamillion year pause, and then Kelly returns for more Four Eyes?  Well strike me down and color me charteuse, then insert some joke about expecting some more issues of Steampunk.

But in the same way that Bad Dog felt like it put a bit too clean of a cap on the initial story, Act Two of Four Eyes lacks the subtleties of its previous installment.  Over the four issues, Enrico essentially steps up to become the type of trainer he wants to be for his fightin’ dragon Four Eyes, while his mum makes googly eyes at their suave new boarder, Jorge, who’s also seemingly intent on becoming a new father figure for Enrico.

Mister Fawkes attempts to show the boy the reality of dragon fighting – the abuse, and the death – and Jorge, successful in wooing ‘Rico’s mother, decides to show the boy some discipline with the back of his hand.  Soon, the cycle of abuse occurs, and Enrico is taking out his frustrations on Four Eyes, as well as sniping at Fawkes.  It’s all very logical but too tidy for something that felt so respectfully open-ended before.  Kelly does have a habit of tip-toeing back and forth between moments of wonderful creativity and genius and incredible cliche; hopefully Four Eyes can lean back toward the former.  The final pages of the Act give that indication, and we can see these machinations as a required runaround to get characters into a certain position.  But ideally we’ll get Act Three in a reasonable amount of time to see what direction this will all take.

Art-wise, the decision to go b&w / sepia-toned, like the story, is logical, given the setting and tone, but too on-the-nose for projecting a “serious” vibe.  It also, unfortunately, makes some of the more intense panels hard to read.  On the plus side, Fiumara’s art remains particularly impressive (although issue four felt a bit rushed), matched – and perhaps beaten out at points – by issue 2 and 3’s Rafael Ortiz.

So at this point, Four Eyes isn’t quite the overwhelmingly fresh experience of its initial issues, and is more of a ‘wait and see’ comic.  But that’s still a credit – I am waiting, and I would like to see.