Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Writer: Brian Wood
Artist: Andrea Mutti
Colourist: Jordie Bellaire
Editor: Sierra Hann
Release date: Out now
Price: $3.99

In the early 1900s The Liberty Boys of ’76 dime novels were a fun diversion featuring clever boy heroes who defied all odds and saved the day. Rebels, an historical action-adventure series, set during the Revolutionary War, seems as shallow but is, unfortunately, less fun and one too many lost opportunities.

Rebels #4 occurs during 1775 and the battles of Breed’s and Bunker Hills. Love-sick Seth Abbott, the hero of Ft. Ticonderoga, and the whiny Green Mountain Boys Militia are mercenaries working for Ethan Allen and the Continental Congress. Although these are real people at real events author Brian Wood makes no claims of historical accuracy, so the reader doesn’t have to fact-check. Unless, of course, one wants to do so, of course.

The homesick mountain boys are tasked with packing and guarding some cannons for transport, which isn’t the job Abbott expected. But he’ll do it because he’s more worried about disappointing General Washington waiting for delivery than going home to see his sweetie. The tension in Rebels #4 is less dramatic than boring.

The story addresses the context of the war from a fighter’s point of view. But Wood immediately loses points for trying to be clever and then ignoring an opportunity to say something interesting. In two places Abbott mocks the famous battle cry: “Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes!” as dangerous folly from ivory towers, but misses a chance to discuss the context: saving precious ammunition.

Wood loses another opportunity in Rebels #4 when forest man Abbott escalates the war from standard structured duelling to Indian tactics, literally shooting British soldiers in the back. Wood fails to investigate the ethics of escalation, the moral price of victory and the concept of war crimes, which is foreign to end-justifies-the-means Abbott. Or on another level, is Abbott right about the concept of civilized war being a lie? Writer Wood doesn’t seem to care. Wood also chooses not explore the interesting idea of the escalation as an elegant metaphor for American culture.

Ultimately Rebels is about Abbott and his boys who represent the classic American wild man trying to fit into civilized society. Unfortunately, the dime novels did it better and made it fun to boot.

Reviewer: Joe Lovece
Reviews Editor: Steve Hooker