Pre-release Review for Quantum and Woody Must Die #1

Quantum and Woody Must Die #1

Written by: James Asmus

Art by: Steve Lieber

Colored by: Dace McCaig

Lettered by: Dave Lanphear

Cover by: Mike Hawthorne with Jordie Bellaire

Published by: Valiant

Cover Price: $3.99

Note: This is a review of the digital version which can be found on Comixology.

Warning! This review contains quite a few spoilers!

Summary (contains spoilers): This issue starts in the docks of Baltimore, Maryland.  Two female criminals named the Dominos and their crew attack an FDA truck.  Quantum and Woody arrive on the scene to try and stop them.

One of the gang drives off with the truck, and Quantum and Woody give chase.  It turns out this was a distraction in order for the Dominos to slip off with a case labeld Sample 94.  I assume this was a callback to the series' origins (Quantum and woody first appeared in 1994).

Quantum and Woody demolish the truck, causing the driver to get covered in chemicals.  Woody hopes that the driver will get super powers from this...more on him later...

Later, we find out that Quantum and Woody had been hired to investigate missing cellphone shipments at the dock, but had stumbled across this crime scene.

We also find out that Quantum and Woody have been in counseling, which is probably a long time coming.  This has resulted in them being on the same page for change.  But the counselor seems to be hypnotizing them for his own nefarious purposes.  You take the good with the bad, I guess.

Meanwhile, we find out that the Domino Twins were hired by a company called Z-Nyth to track down a chemical compound the FDA had confiscated in a raid.  The compound seems to cause mutations, and even super powers.  The Dominoes realize that Z-Nyth is about to kill them to prevent them from talking about what they have seen, so they let loose some monsters from Z-Nyth's lab and try to escape.

Quantum and Woody receive a mysterious call telling them to go to Z-Nyth.  They arrive just as the Dominos are escaping.  They split up to try and stop the Dominos and the Z-Nyth monsters.  The Dominos manage to get away, but the press still treats Quantum and Woody like heroes.

While this has been going on, the counselor has gone to see the driver hurt in the crash Quantum and Woody caused.  The counselor reveals there is a group of people targeting Quantum and Woody for revenge.  The driver agrees to join them.

Review: Before I start this review, I want to pull back the curtain a little bit.  Valiant is extremely generous for comic book journalists.  They make reviewer copies readily available in plenty of time to get reviews up before the comics come out, and they could not be more accommodating.  I think this is a great business practice and would love some of the bigger companies to do this more often.

As for the comic itself, first I have to say that Quantum and Woody always makes me laugh out loud.  I typically read most of my comics on the bus home from work, but I've had to make it a rule to never read Quantum and Woody on the bus because the driver referred to me as "disturbing the other passengers."  Whoops.

Ever since Christopher Priest and MD Bright started the series back in 1994, Quantum and Woody has always been politically incorrect.  James Asmus has kept this tradition going when he brought it back for Valiant 2 years ago.  You can't help but laugh at the things they get away with in this book.  And you will often feel a little guilt because of how hard you are laughing at inappropriate things..like a racist militia who are shocked to discover their hero Quantum is black. This issue features Quantum blurting out that there is no Santa Claus in a restaurant and making a small child cry.  The look on the kid's face should make you feel bad, but I just couldn't stop giggling like an idiot.  And that sequence is after a long discussion about Woody's inability to tell Asian people apart.

I also love that Woody is so unrepentantly a bastard.  You keep waiting for him to have an Afterschool Special moment, but nah, Woody is just Woody.  Greedy, self-centered, slightly racist and sexist, and probably the worst brother straight-laced Quantum could have imagined.  It takes a lot to make a character like this...well...likeable is probably not the right word.  But, he stays entertaining and not quite obnoxious.  That takes some real care when writing a book like this.  It would be way too easy to make you hate Woody.

This issue puts some interesting twists on Quantum and Woody's dynamic.  Quantum and Woody are getting along for a change, though this seems to be because of hypnosis and chemical manipulation.  They are also getting good press as real heroes.  So much so that Woody was able to get away with some of the ridiculous things that should get him thrown in jail.  He's gone from human garbage to loveable scamp.

There was one way this was a major upgrade from the previous Quantum and Woody series: the art.  I really fell in love with Steve Lieber's work on Superior Foes of Spider-Man, and he brings that to great effect here.  Quantum and Woody haven't looked this good since MD Bright did the original series.

Really, this new mini-series is just more of the same for Quantum and Woody...but that is definitely the best possible thing they could have done.  The stories and characters are so damn entertaining, and Steve Lieber brings some terrific art talent to this title.  Quantum and Woody was definitely my favorite comic that I read this week.  HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!