So despite all the ribbing, John Byrne does have enough goodwill in the bank with me that I gave the first issue of Trio a try today. And I'll say this for it: there's an incredibly cute moment on the first page. A robot is shooting at some cops, and he lays down some smack-talk, where he goes, "Not so tough, are you, when you don't have your pet superheroes to protect you!"

And one of the cops says... out loud... "He's got that right!"

It doesn't seem like it was intended to be funny, but I'm being genuine here... the fact that a cop basically yelled, "Hells no! We are straight up wusses!" was hilarious and charming.

Anyway. I'm glad that was there, because the rest of the book has got problems. Of the three main characters, not one has any noticeable personality. One of them is injured in the issue, and I guess we're supposed to care? But since our only exposure to the injured character is about three or four lines of cliche superhero fight speech, they might as well be a redshirt.

The dialogue is amazingly stilted, even for Byrne. The only time any character even tries to speak anywhere near naturally, it's just an excuse for Byrne to cram the "don't call superheroes by nicknames" chip on his shoulder into the narrative. The art is reasonably pretty, although the inking on Scissors' costume is incredibly distracting. The "shininess" of all the white highlights actually makes him look like he's wearing a vinyl BDSM suit.

I think it's safe to say I won't be picking up the second issue. Although it wasn't all bad; I like the purple and green interchangeable villain guys. Not because they were interesting or anything, I just like purple and green together. And there's a Fred Hembeck strip in the back, which is always nice.

That bit did stick out like a sore thumb. And it was just weird in this case, since we're not really sure what any of the characters' names really are yet. The heroes call one another One, Two, and Three. So it sounds like Paper, Scissors, and Rock may be newspaper-created nicknames already, so why would Rocky or Rockster be any more objectionable than that?

Continuing the naming confusion, I'm not sure whether Scissors' real name is Ahmed? And when he answers his cell phone, he says "Leslie... sorry, Habibi... I can't talk right now." So was he saying his own name there, or somehow getting confused about his girlfriend's name?

Likewise, the merman bad guy says "My true name you could never pronounce." Why, because it's really Namor, and we would get sued? But the placeholder name, Nautilus, is actually not bad, and he does have shell-motifs on his head and shoulders to make it more logical.

More confusion: first Rock says he needs to stay and help dig out survivors from the wrecked building. But when he realizes that the time is 20 or 30 minutes later than he previously realized, suddenly he has to run off and change back to human because of the pain of transforming after staying rocky for too long?!?!? And the transformation itself takes "Twenty excruciating minutes" anyway? But he's able to greet his family a few minutes later with no signs of distress?

So, yeah, nothing really here to hold the interest. Unless we're somehow ultra-curious about why Ahmed is dating a girl who changed her name from Leslie to Habibi? My guess at this point is that she had been given an American-sounding name by her immigrant parents to help her blend in, but she's now asserting her cultural identity with a more Arabic-sounding name? I'm sure that John Byrne's insights into Muslim-American identity politics will make the next issue a must-read blockbuster!

I thought it was okay for what Byrne is trying to do. Plenty of kids would probably like it if they could buy it at their local grocery or drug store for 50 cents.

Mike

AHAHAHAHAHAhaahahaHAHAHAhaha!

From the John Byrne Forum thread on TRIO:



Nathan Greno
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 6944
Posted: 10 May 2012 at 12:28am | IP Logged | 5 post reply

Have we heard about sales? Is this a series or a mini? I think sales were going to decide that, correct?

Nice to have a new, fun, all-ages comic on the stands.

I look forward to issue 2

Bravo


John Byrne
Next!
Joined: 11 May 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 78582
Posted: 10 May 2012 at 10:32am | IP Logged | 17 post reply

Have we heard about sales? Is this a series or a mini? I think sales were going to decide that, correct?

••

You keep coming back to this, Nathan. Is my pointed silence not sufficient answer?

Okay, the orders SUCKED.

Happy now?

Careful, Nathan. You're falling into the same trap that Aric Shapiro and Wayne Osborne did.

So Byrne thinks he can communicate through pointed silences? Doesn't he know that we comics readers need to see lightning and daggers coming out of his eyes, or smoke coming out of his ears?

One thing leads to another.

I don't know Nathan Greno. But Byrne-watchers tell me the dude spends a fortune on Byrne commissions. He's one of the dwindling number of hardcore Byrne fans, one of The Loyal 1,000.

Naturally, Byrne shits on him.

Apparently Nathan Greno works for Disney or Pixar or some film company like that? Greno has been to Byrne's house to visit, and Byrne credited him with some ideas that Byrne used in the current Next Men: Aftermath series.

Hmm, yeah, Budman is right. It sounds a lot like Osborne and Shapiro, where they got too personally close to Byrne, treated him like a friend and equal, and he eventually drove them away.

Yes. Osborne made a lot of money from mining and commissioned byrne for an entire 6 issue comic, as well as one large commision after another. Aric Shapiro is a lawyer who loves byrne and commissioned his version of batman many times over. They both tried to maintain a friendship that Nathen is attempting and both ended up on the bad side of byrne.