Rawhide Kid #1: Raw Is War
Ron Zimmerman, the writer who notoriously revived the Rawhide Kid as a campy gay stereotype has taken the reigns one more time for a 4-issue miniseries. One would certainly hope that allowing a few years-worth of criticisms to sink in would allow for a fairer depiction of the character, but it turns out my problems with the issue would come from entirely different elements.
The opening scene aims to establish Rawhide as a legend, calling on of the western classic 'Magnificent Seven' in its title. He rides into town above a warring throng and breaks it up. He'll be brushing hair and having a heart-to-heart with Annie Oakley soon after. But by now I'm already lost gawking at the blandness in the artwork.
Chaykin's art shows it can do Western grizzle, but the effort is visibly lacking. The mob scenes recycle panels with only the tiniest of differences between them. I understand how exhaustive it can be to render multiple drones in action, but there's no excuse for using the cut-and-paste method on single panel close-ups of Rawhide's face, only to redraw another gun in the foreground. Call it time-saving, call it cutting corners, but it's mostly lazy art thrown into a mold, and it doesn't benefit the story that's being told. Panel recycling, in my opinion, works best in succession, to highlight stagnation in the action. But what does it say about the artist's care for his half of the tale when, by page 3, he's employed 'Generic Inaction' panel, followed by 'Generic Action' panel and repeats them? (Generic Inaction panel even gets a third iteration, for good luck) It doesn't add to the comedic value, if that's what's being implied of the scene, and it gives the letterer more work than the artist.
Zimmerman's writing, on the other hand, suffers from inconsistency; He has trouble consolidating the varied aspects of Rawhide's character. You can almost hear his voice in each scene, going "This scene is going to show how badass he is. But then he's going to whip out a fan with a naked man on it, (There must've been plenty of those in the modest 19th century) but then we have to show he's as sensible as he is sensitive, so now we'll steer our hero into action!" Stunningly, I believe that this Rawhide character as the charismatic sharpshooter he's made out to be, but I'm getting three distinct personalities instead of a functioning whole. The writer spends time showing us the squabbling Mario brothers in prison, or the bumbling subordinate to General Pike. Zimmerman must think his idiot characters provide a 3 Stooges charm, but this comic left me dry. This self-proclaimed "epic" has little to indicate a progressive plot, and a weak supporting cast. I didn't care for Rawhide Kid before, and the title does little to make me take notice of him now.
Rubber Justice
Posted to Review on 11 June 2010
· Comments (3)
Other stuff like this: Marvel, Rawhide Kid, unintentional rhyming, western
That's so, so disappointing to me. I keep wanting to like the Rawhide Kid because I've liked the idea of it so much, but it keeps not living up to its potential as a story. I was going to pick this up, but I think you've helped me save a couple of bucks.
Don't care about the book itself, just pointing out that you've bought into some weird propaganda if you think the 1800s didn't have lewd paraphernalia.
I was put off by the stereotype character in the first series, so I had already decided not to buy this new one. Remember the Bugs Bunny cartoon where he is stuck in the mad scientist's castle, chased by the big red monster (named Rudolph and later Gossamer)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLdKU4JCYqg
I laugh at this cartoon in spite of myself- is the joke supposed to be that he's saying funny gay things, or just that he's gay? More of the first one, I think. But I look at the first Rawhide Kid and ask myself the same question, and think, Bugs Bunny was doing this shtick 60 years ago, for chrissakes.