Comic Book Review: Human Target #5
by R.J. Carter
Published: December 14, 2003
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Human Target #5 |
"Take Me Out To The Ballgame"
part two: The Strike Zone |
Peter Milligan
Javier Pulido |
Vertigo |
$2.95 US
$4.50 CAN |
A |
For more information: Vertigo Comics link |
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Ted Williams worked it all out.
A hitter--that's me--has less than half a second to react. In other words...
A 95 mph fast ball crosses the batting plate just .04 seconds after it's pitched.
Well, at least that's a lot slower than a bullet.
And I've faced plenty of those before.
A famous baseball player has the best game of his life, then throws himself out a window. Christopher Chance, the man who bills himself as the Human Target, has been brought in to find out why.
Chance's forte is impersonation, possessing a muscle-memory of supernatural proportions. He studies a subject, watches him, listens to him, and--with the help of makeup and prosthetics--becomes him, almost to the exclusion of memories of his true self. In this case, the subject is teammate Larry McGee, a washed-up ballplayer who used to be a star. By impersonating McGee, Chance hopes to uncover the mystery behind the suicide of Ruben Valdez.
But the one thing he didn't count on was actually having to play any real baseball. And that's where he finds himself on the opening of this chapter: right behind home plate staring down a nasty fastball.
But he's prepared himself the only way he knows how. And his flawless impersonation of Larry McGee--when he was great--attracts the attention of the same gamblers who blackmailed Valdez approach "McGee" with a videotape just like the one they showed Valdez. Their demands: throw the next game, or the tape--and its revelation of past steroid use--goes public.
 Peter Milligan stirs up an addictive cocktail of two of America's favorite pasttimes--bullets and baseballs--in an adrenaline rush of suspense storytelling that just happens to use comics as its medium. Javier Pulido's artwork is a style uniquely his own that shows just how much can be communicated with just a very few pencil marks.
If you aren't reading Human Target, you're missing the mark.
In stores Wednesday, December 17, 2003.
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