Whether you’re fans of their music or not, it’d be tough to argue with the idea that Radiohead was one of the most important and influential bands of the 2000’s. Fans who bought In Rainbows digitally on the week that they released it will probably never forget what that felt like. It was DRM-free and yours for whatever price you wanted to pay. For me, it felt like a trick for a few seconds. Nothing like this had been done before. At least not from such a major figure in pop culture. How utterly fitting is it that Brian K. Vaughan would be the Radiohead-esque figurehead for the age of the independent creator?
Written by Brian K. Vaughan
Illustrated by Marcos MartinSet in a future where privacy is considered a sacred right and everyone has a secret identity, The Private Eye is a serialized sci-fi detective story for mature readers.
As a straight narrative, “The Private Eye” is as competent as any noir story you’ll read in comics this year. It’s much more than a straight narrative, but more on that later. “The Private Eye” features the future Earth populated with citizens for whom privacy has become the greatest personal commodity. So much so that they will spend all kinds of money and go through all kinds of trouble to avoid being “known.” As such, this “detective” story is literally a paparazzi parable that is certainly magnified many times over as it’s extrapolated decades into the future, but still rings true in the year 2013. With homages and reference to classic noir films and novels, “The Private Eye” presents the future as a cycling back toward simpler times – a time before anyone could Google their own selfies. “The Private Eye” in its first issue paints this future as progress through technological regression. It’s a dangerous line for Vaughan to toe, but it stops short of becoming preachy or hamfisted. The only storytelling crime committed is in some of the details of what the future will be like for American culture. Whether these are played for humor or merely highlighted as a way that America has “advanced” its values, they stick out a little bit. Then again, they are likely intended to stick out. But they aren’t handled as casually or deftly as they could have been. A small complaint for a book that does everything else right.
But “The Private Eye” is more than a digital comic file and the compelling story within. “The Private Eye” is a statement about the internet, your privacy, and the very fact that you now own this comic and can access it on your own terms. It’s the very best type of metatextual storytelling, because the comic tells a straightforward and gripping futuristic detective story with splendid art – even though the comic itself is essentially about the nature of its very existence. So it not only exists as a pinpoint on the timeline of digital comic book history, but the story is about that very pinpoint.
Brian K. Vaughan doesn’t have much of an internet presence. Read between the lines of interviews and his own work and you can see that he thinks that the technology is useful, but is also very careful about what he puts out there. The man doesn’t use Facebook or Twitter. He doesn’t have a website (I guess, until “Panel Syndicate” with this comic’s release). The story he writes in “The Private Eye” reflects that wariness to put oneself out there in “The Information Age.” Technology is important, useful, and should be developed, but Vaughan argues for a re-focusing of efforts. He calls for it within the “pages” of the comic book and he calls it up, again, by the very existence of “The Private Eye” as a piece of technology free from ties to its distribution platform or DRM (digital rights management). Through technology, we can deliver information to people we would never have had contact with before, but how much control we give to the companies who run these services is often overlooked. Vaughan isn’t saying that things were better before color television. He’s simply saying that we need to think about where we’re getting our information from and who we are giving our power to. Man, all that from the pages of a slick-looking neo-noir?
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And how beautifully slick the look of this book truly is. Marcos Martin has stepped up his game in a big way, even from his incredibly eye-catching and smartly structured “Daredevil” work. Though his is a name that carries plenty of clout and caught just as many eyes as the name “Brian K. Vaughan” did, this really feels like Martin’s “coming-out-party” as a comic book artist. Martin shares ownership of this property with Vaughan and you can feel that this is a true partnership rather than an art gig. As such, you can see the passion in his work and the love that’s put into the final product. He peppers the city scenes with figures of literally every shape, color, and eccentricity that he could come up with. He again plays with the idea that our privacy and our identities are sacred, but that we still want to stand out and define ourselves to the world. All of this plays out so well in the ultra-modern visuals that Vaughan needs not call much attention to it with the script.
The colors of Muntsa Vicente play a vital role in how great the art in this book comes together. Not only are Martin’s drawings the tightest they’ve ever been, but the whole product of his interior art looks better than it ever has thanks to the color choices. All the most moody or suspenseful moments in the book choose to drop backgrounds out in favor of bold solid color choices to matte behind the characters and inform the tone of the scene. The most impressive moment of art in the story takes place in an early chase sequence, where the vast futuristic cityscape behind our “private eye” sings with a variety of neon greens and violets. It’s stunning work that evokes exactly the stop-you-in-your-tracks effect that it’s aiming for.
Vaughan and Martin’s story went from being completely off-the-grid, to a delightful tease to kick off the week, to what will certainly end up being the “pick of the week” for many a comic fan this week. “The Private Eye” is so good that it beat the rest of the books this week before they even showed up. But comics aren’t about who’s beating who. Comics should be about creating, and sharing, and cultivating a culture of imagination that we enjoy in a way that makes sense for everyone involved. “The Private Eye” is a darn fine detective story, but more importantly, it represents what digital comics can aspire to be.
Final Verdict: 9.1 – Buy it. And buy it for whatever you believe comics should cost in the year 2013.
