Cyber Force: Shootout #1 // Review
A decommission android is brought back online. Clearly there was some sort of a malfunction, right? The issue is: it's an Aphrodite IV model. One of those things could destroy an entire army. So naturally it's more than a little bit of a concern that it would happen to be up and running again when it has been decommissioned. The matter must be dealt with in Cyber Force: Shootout #1. The cyberpunk one-shot makes it to page and panel courtesy of writer Billy Muggelberg, artist Bruno Abdias and colorist John Starr. It's a tight, little story that plays out quite tiidily between two covers at the end of the summer of 2024.
The model is holed-up in the old Pittsburgh factory district. They’re bgoing to send-in Ballistic to track it down and eliminate it. There are no limitations on weaponry. Time is of the essence. If the Aphrodite unit has to establish itself, it’s going to be MUCH more formidable. Ballistic is going to have to act immediately if she is to be able to get the thing...terminally decommissioned. That’s going to be a bit of a challenge considering how deadly an Aphrodite IV is.
This is a classic chase and hunt sort of a thing. With androids, that’s going to feel a HELL of a lot like Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. The challenge is to make it feel new. Muggelberg it doesn't do a terribly good job of making it feel new or fresh or anything like that. It's just a simple hunt and destroy sort of a thing. Within an engagement towards the end. It's not really all that interesting. However, it doesn't have to be. The action is well set-up. It's well-framed. the basic conflict is outlined in the first couple of pages. There's a hunt. And engagement. A resolution. And it all happens in less than 32 pages.
The visuals are handed with a highly kinetic style that fits the overall feel of a cyberpunk shoot out quite well. It's not committed to the page in a wave that feels exhilarating, though. It's just a very simple shoot out. It's a hunt. There is no whole lot that, this from standard cowboy-western style . The visuals are very appealing in places. But there isn't anything that's truly inspired about the execution of the situation.
The deeper questions of what it means to hunt an android that is essentially very human or lost to a very schematic look at the human-like person hunting another. there's a lack of finesse or artistic insight that really makes this worth anything more than a simple shoot out. Which is really too bad. Because there is more to be said that hadn't been expressed with this sort of action story by Phillip K. Dick over half a century ago in the novel that inspired the Bladerunner franchise.
