Bibiana Lopez-Yang has returned from war a bit damaged. She’s changing. So is the San Francisco that she has returned to. The big corporation defending the city is pulling out of Chinatown. Now a violent group threatens to take over. It’s got a new protector. Things might get wild as The Dead Lucky opens its first issue. Writer Melissa Flores brings a recovering veteran to the page in a dark future that resonates with visual life courtesy of artist French Carlomagno and colorist Mattia Iacono. A damaged veteran returns to defend those not defended by the authorities. It’s an appealing iteration of an old superhero trope. 

Bibiana talks to herself. A lot. Sometimes she’s in the middle of a conversation with someone at the time. Like maybe she’s talking to her therapist, and she finds herself talking to the only one in the room who is capable of understanding her situation. She’s a veteran. She’s lost friends to battle. The corporation defending Chinatown has left. The police can’t keep up. Bibiana has some powers. She has some tech. She might be able to save the place she’s from if only she can keep it together long enough to do so.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is really difficult to bring to the page of an action comic. In the opening issue of the new series, Flores avoids really laying into Bibiana’s issues. The narrative rests on the surface as she’s integrating what San Francisco and its Chinatown have become. The basic plot and premise of this particular dark future need to be established, so there’s kind of a lot of groundwork that needs to be established. Flores does a solid job of world-building with the first intallment, but she’s going to have a hell of a job moving forward and contrasting the horrors in Bibiana’s past against the violence happening in her present.  

Carlomagno’s sleek visuals slide across the page. The inner turmoil slashing around inside Bibiana doesn’t feel all that present on the page. There’s a stillness even to the action that seems to speak to a desensitization in and within the heart of the main character. Bibiana IS interesting, but it will take some time for Carlomagno to construct the right visual language to allow the reader into her mind. Iacono’s colors feel clean and splashy with lots of cool purples and greenish blues. Dead Lucky’s San Francisco is a nice place, but it feels a little washed-out and lo-res.

The basic elements of the story are still establishing themselves at the issue’s end. It’s difficult to tell whether or not the story will develop in a way that feels truly interesting. The basic elements are there in a way that could prove to be interesting in the long run, but it’s difficult to tell as a terrorist group explodes into view at the issue’s close. The hero is clear. Precisely what the hero is up against is going to determine the weight of the series.

Grade: B-