4 out of 5

Buzzkill had sounded pretty dumb, so I gave The Paybacks a miss for an issue.  But a review convinced me to give it a chance, and sure enough, it was worth it.  I was all “sweet” regarding the new writers I’d found (Donny Cates and Eliot Rahal), and then panicked when they started writing separately, both having titles announced for Heavy Metal’s new comic line.  Cates’ Interceptor started up first, and… review pending, but it’s a lot of Idea that’s not written all that well.  To further test the waters I picked up Buzzkill, and something-something fitting title, because the book was maybe sort of as dumb as it had initially sounded.  Was the magic really just in the team-up?  Or was the humor and intelligence heavily lent by Rahal?

Doorman has me thinking the latter.  Which is really insulting to Mr. Cates, but look: people liked Buzzkill.  So it seems like I just prefer what your partner brings to the equation.  (Although, yes, I lobbed the bigger pieces of the puzzle to him, leaving only “hip lingo” with Donny, but I’m allowed my bias interpretation, so says the internet.)

Doorman is one of those perfect high-concept books that works super well in comics but would take too much extra work to set up as a movie or show.  That there are things called Doors that allow travel between worlds, and that there’s a secret society of Porters who are the only ones schooled in operating such Doors, and no one really knows where the whole thing started.  Yep, cool, got it, all in a paragraph.  Moving on.

Henry Clay has done his time as a Doorman, rarely meeting travelers, and its time to retire.  Like all great “last day” setups, though, shit hits the fan, in the form of an assassin popping through the door (which shouldn’t be possible without a Doorman assist…), soon followed by non-Earthling Officer Flowers (also shouldn’t be possible without a Doorman assist), who saves Clay from laser beams and then whisks him away to usher her around to solve a conspiracy involving shady business guy Moongale and some hilariously both vague and convoluted plan to make a lot of money.  Allegiances are tested, a lot of laugh-out-loud jokes are made, and Rahal just keeps it moving, each issue successfully adding a new wrinkle and not allowing us to get too bogged down with trying to justify the whole setup.  Not that that’s always the best method, of course, but the Doorman idea itself is so clear that it was the right choice for this go-round, and tossing us into the fire gets us pass the whole “aliens are real!” explanations as well.  Henry’s cool with it.  So are we.

Artist Kendall Goode was a nice weighty style with a Richard Case look to his characters but painted over with an appealing cartoonishness.  There’s a lot of ‘acting’ required in script, and Goode proves absolutely up to the task, selling the humor as well as making the offhandedly mentioned elements of the plot (Undercover janitors! Killer publicists!) slip right in to the rest of the hijinks with naray a beat missed and even time for a bit of a wink to the reader, knowing how crazy all this stuff is.  Coloring as well, Kendall’s palette leans toward pinks and blues with a good balance between blended backgrounds and flats in the foreground, brought to bright life by Heavy Metal’s publishing.  Also lettering, Kendall has a good sense of placement (not always the case with artist / letterers) and shows an impressive range of styles, although he tries to pull the Ryan Browne “sound effect describes the sound its making” joke and it’s just a bit more on-the-nose than Ryan’s ridiculous version of it, and is a tad too-4th wall-breaking for the series; it definitely causes a hiccup in the immersion.

The story also has some conclusion anxiety, setting up a lot of pieces that feel rather pointless in the final confrontation, and which Rahal lampshades several times, but the quick pace and humor keep things afloat and entertaining.  More importantly, it ends with a ‘to be continued’ pledge, which I’m fine saying can only be a good thing.

Team Rahal, knuckleheads.