Publisher: Boom! Studios
Writer: J.G. Jones, Mark Waid
Artist: J.G. Jones
Colourist: J.G. Jones
Editor: Bryce Carlson
Release Date: OUT NOW!
Price: $3.99

What would happen if Superman landed as a giant black man smack dab in the middle of pre-Civil Rights Mississippi? That’s the concept playing out in Strange Fruit #3. The KKK is in full swing in Charterlee and even an engineer from Washington, D.C. is called “boy”.

In Strange Fruit #3 Mississippi is on a hair-trigger. The levee threatens to break, a young boy is missing, and the appearance of the giant, silent alien, dubbed by one of the workers Johnson, isn’t helping matters. Or is he?

J.G. Jones artwork for Strange Fruit #3 is pure genius, and with his painted pages Jones may be the next Alex Ross. Colours are deliberately muted, to reflect the grey, storm-ridden clouds gathering a pace in Strange Fruit #3.

Deconstructing the Klan’s inhumanity and the south’s history of segregation and civil rights abuse for Strange Fruit #3 may appear to be a slow-moving target, writers Jones and Mark Waid manage to infuse the story with plenty of interesting dialogue, and philosophy and psychology, even if the villains are somewhat one-dimensional.

Strange Fruit #3 is a gorgeous crisis. Despite the plight of poor and rich alike in the face of natural disaster Strange Fruit #3 finds beauty not only in the art but also in the hope that mankind’s ugliness and ignorance may give way to cooperation and justice. And that’s a lesson that needs repeating more than once.

 

Reviewer: Joe Lovece
Reviews Editor: Steve Hooker