The manga/steampunk adventure continues, as Dee tries to figure out what’s happened to her airship, who shot it down, and how in the world did she end up on the ground (since the clouds are so deadly…aren’t they?)
Click the jump for preview pages and a review of Tyson Hesse’s Diesel #3.
When Dee wakes up (after dreaming a flashback about a childhood arrival to the city-ship Peacetown) she has no idea how she ended up “under the clouds.” As far as she knows nothing can go through the storm line…except for the ship that shot down Peacetown.
So she’s stranded, with no idea if there were any other survivors, no way to find them if there are, and her ability to create electric sparks with a snap has disappeared.
Oh, and giant mutant coyotes attack. Because her day just can’t get worse.
Luckily for her, she meets up with another member of her adopted family, someone she lost touch with years ago. Actually, it’s the second long-lost relative she’s seen recently; she’s hoping she’s wrong, but she’s afraid someone in her family shot down her ship.
The art is my favorite part about this series. It continues to be a manga style that’s very easy on the eyes: beautiful and detailed, without so much of the extra-exaggerated expressions that I dislike about some manga. The gestures and faces are still stylized in a lot of places, but not to the point where they look ridiculous.
The details are lovely: there’s a tiny panel in the bottom right corner where Dee looks to the right after hearing thunder: for such a small panel every line is clear and lovely. The colors too are perfect for the story; a little sepia to give it a steampunk flavor, dark greys and greens to make it industrial, but a lot of bright colors as accents throughout.
The story is fun too, Dee’s long-lost family member in particular is hilarious: he has very little patience with the little pity-party she’s throwing, but he still manages to be sympathetic, while teasing the heck out of her (but she gives back as good as she gets.)
He also gets her to admit what she’s been doing with her life; she believes she’s not really good at much (she hopes some talent will fall in her lap eventually) so she’s been killing time doing as little as she can get away with, until she can inherit her ship and be the boss. And do more nothing. No one else has really gotten her to take a good look at that, and it’s a nice moment.
The next issue is supposed to be the final one of this series, where Dee gets the answers that she’s probably not going to like. I know it’s greedy to be impatient for the next issue and hope that there will be more issues after that, but from what I’ve seen I don’t think four will be enough, I’d like lots more.
Preview pages courtesy of BOOM! Studios.