Publisher: Image Comics
Writer: Rick Remender
Artist: Sean Gordon Murphy & Matt Hollingsworth
Release date: 16 September 2015
Price: $3.50/Digital: $2.99
Image Comics
Another day, another post-apocalyptic dystopia hits the fan in the Isles of Los Angeles circa 2089!
In Tokyo Ghost #1 mankind uses electronic steroids to turn reality into a video game. Think Judge Dredd meets Grand Theft Auto dialled up to eleven.
The heroes in Tokyo Ghost #1 are two private cops, Debbie Decay (the brains) and Led Dent (the muscle). Led was her sweetheart Teddy until he became “net-blank”, or totally addicted to electronic media. Debbie Decay spends the issue commiserating about it. “You’re gone, Teddy. The boy I love lost inside the man he’s become.” All she wants to do it take him to Tokyo which is rumoured to be tech-free.
In Tokyo Ghost #1 the villain is wise-cracking sociopath Davy Trauma, a cross between the Joker and Clockwork Orange’s Alex. “I am the Jesus of murder,” Trauma brags. Trauma, whose mind lives in the net, can control anybody through their nanopacs. “Kill your love into my heart,” says one of his more misguided puppets.
The only person immune to Davy Trauma is Debbie Decay, since she doesn’t have the nano-upgrades, although she still manages somehow to jump around like Harley Quinn on adrenaline. Debbie Decay needs to capture Trauma since it will be her last job as a cop.
Writer Rick Remender’s script is full of depressing poetry. “Exhaust-filled humidity leaves an alkaline tingle in my mouth,” says Debbie. Sean Murphy’s art wonderfully matches the insanity of the action. And Hollingsworth uses bright colors to offset the dark techno world.
Tokyo Ghost #1 puts a new shine on an old chestnut, and makes it work. We’re rooting for you, Debbie.
Reviewer: Joe Lovece
Reviews Editor: Steve Hooker