In Evan Dorkin's "The Northwest Comix Collective," one character howls in the midst of an anti-superhero tirade, "Superhero parody comics are still fucking superhero comics!" The line is one small part of a deep-thrusting parody of the DIY artcomics community, but it touches on a divisive question -- is the superhero a viable artistic subject? While the knee-jerk response is to answer no, to agree with Dorkin's Aaron Winkleman and declare that comics that approach the superhero from an alternative angle are devoid of artistic sophistication solely because they include superheroes, the evidence suggests otherwise. Many of the top cartoonists of the day, including Dorkin, Daniel Clowes, Chris Ware and Richard Sala, continue to include super-characters in one form or another in even their most recent work. Why? Because the superhero presents a unique problem that any cartoonist concerned with the history of the medium must face. No other medium has had its recent history so dominated by one genre as comics has been by the superhero story. It is only natural that cartoonists whose aesthetics would appear to conflict with those represented in superhero comics would find themselves drawn to address the genre in their own work. To do so does not illegitimize that work; rather, it is the mark of an artist wrestling with the strange history of his or her art form.

It is in the tradition of these artists that Mike Bertino explores the well-traveled terrain of the superhero story in "Everyman," from his minicomic Trigger. "Everyman" is a superhero mystery visually grounded in the real world. The landscape is, for the most part, free of the garish trappings of superhero comics -- cosmic powers, costumed villains, etc. But the superhero element is not a facade artificially imposed on the story. In the third panel of the first chapter, Bertino's narrator tells the reader, "The point is this: Someone has uncovered my secret identity, and has been playing tricks on me. They've been leaving phony clues, and leading me into awkward and embarrassing situations." "Everyman" is the story of the search to find the person who has uncovered the identity of Nigil Fox, the Everyman. Though it may not have the outward appearance of a superhero story, Everyman springs exclusively from an old superheroic conceit -- the secret identity.

Nigil Fox is in many ways similar to the hero of Clowes' excellent "Black Nylon." Both are workaday schlubs who long ago lost all enthusiasm for the life they lead. In "Black Nylon," Clowes' narrator tells the reader, "You can't get too involved with the public; They'll break your heart every time... It doesn't matter how much you think they love you." Likewise, in Everyman, Fox says in reference to the people he protects, "I don't give a shit about those people and they don't give a shit about me." Both characters support these attitudes in actions and words throughout their respective stories.

While the two stories share common plot elements (the mystery stalker is key to both), They differ greatly in structure. "Nylon" is a multi-layered story with several interweaving storylines that come together in the end to deliver the hero to a place very close to where he was when he started. The path of the plot and its structure more closely resemble literary short fiction than superhero comics. "Everyman" is a different beast, far more linear by comparison. The story is driven exclusively by Fox's motivation to solve the mystery, and appears to be creeping toward a climactic, world shattering ending appropriate to a linear, action-driven plot. It is the striking similarity of the two protagonists (Fox is so much like Clowes' character that he could have been lifted out of "Nylon" and dropped into "Everyman"), not the stories themselves, that necessitates this comparison. If Bertino's story pales slightly in comparison, it is only because, through no fault of his own, he is not Daniel Clowes.

While it is not Watchmen or "Black Nylon," "Everyman" proves to be a highly readable, intriguing story. Bertino is still a developing cartoonist, and it is therefore an encouraging sign that he is attempting to master the plot-driven story and that he has been successful thus far in that pursuit. The mystery of Everyman's stalker unfolds in layers. As one truth is revealed, three more questions arise, and the story seems to unfold at a pace just fast enough to keep the final solution consistently out of Fox's grasp. Bertino handles this twisting plot line with a delicate hand that bodes well for the work in question as well as the artist's future work. The archaic truth that one must know the rules before one can break them comes to mind.

The most surprising success of Scan is the way in which the author is able to exploit the framework to which he strictly adheres for a variety effects. If panel layout provides the rhythm of a comic, then Bateman's beat is carried by a marching bass drum. The approach is simple. The top three quarters of the first page are taken up by one large panel with three inset panels depicting a head-and-shoulders frontal view of one character. All three panels are associated with the same caption, one or two lines of dialogue. The bottom quarter of the page has one panel with a shot from the same perspective of a different character, also with one caption. The dialogue always reads as if the character was answering an unheard question from a TV news reporter.

The top three quarters of the opposite page are filled with charts, graphs or tables giving statistical data on the character depicted in the top three quarters of the previous page. One such graph charts the ebbs and flows of one character's brain activity while watching daytime television. Another illustrates how a local prostitute rates other characters based on sexual performance. The final quarter of the page is taken up by a panel similar to the one at the bottom of the previous page, but with a different character. This two-page system is repeated with almost no deviation for much of the book.

The subject about which the characters, all residents of the same unnamed town, are being interviewed is a form of graffiti, the word "Scan," that is slowly taking over the town, figuratively at first, but as the book progresses, the conquest of Scan becomes much more literal. What starts out as mystery graffiti ends up as a super-intelligent entity that takes control of the town and its people. The fact that Bateman is able to create this bridge from graffiti to omniscient overlord is due in large part to the panel structure. The rise of Scan is told in a strict documentary style rather than a traditional narrative one. Events are retold after the fact, almost never shown in progress. This approach softens the sting of unexpected events. These unforseen twists are made more believable by the fact that by the time the reader hears about them, they are already old news in the world of the story.

The repetition of the two-page system creates in the reader an expectation that pertinent information is to be doled out slowly, bit by bit. When Bateman wants to introduce urgency into the narrative or reveal a twist for maximum creepiness, he will deviate from the two page structure, cutting out the graphs for a few pages and going exclusively to the interview shots. Because the original structure is so strictly adhered to throughout most of the book, these deviations, which increase in frequency as the story draws toward its bizarre end, have a powerful effect.

Bateman at times has trouble reconciling a goofy sense of humor with a story that becomes increasingly creepy as it plays out. Bateman's humor is unashamedly cheesy, and while this is not necessarily a negative criticism, the strip could have benefitted from fewer silly lines such as, "He may never say, 'Dude,' again," especially in the later chapters. Bateman gets the most genuine laughs out of the graphs and tables, which poke endless fun at his own characters while also serving as pacing mechanisms. This is where the strength in Scan lies, in the way in which Bateman is able to get so much out what appears to be so little.

In the first panel of Desperate #9, Justin Grimbol stands looking off camera with excitement and says, "I have an idea! I'll do an autobiographical strip about how no girls liked me in middle school." What follows is six pages of Grimbol getting berated for being a loser by figments of his imagination. Some of these figments look like ordinary people, presumably people Grimbol knows, while others include the disembodied heads of the Frankenstein monster, an alien, a bunny and Jesus Christ.

Grimbol takes greater care in drawing a strip where there is no action, no movement even, than most would. Having the faces he is talking to change from panel to panel is a nice touch. He never moves the angle of perspective, but zooms in and out and slides from side to side as he pleases. The resulting visual shake up is just enough to keep he story interesting, but not so much that it ovewrwhelms the strip.

The only criticism one can lobby against Desperate is that Grimbol seems good enough to make the reader wish that he would collect several strips in a larger volumes rather than package one six-page strip with a two page back up into one slim minicomic. It is not easy to judge the quality of a breakfast burrito based on the one cubic inch sample you get from the gray-haired lady at the grocery store.

The thing I find funny about The Journal of MODOK Studies is the same thing I find funny about realultimatepower.net or those Letters From a Nut books by Jerry Seinfeld's buddy -- awkwardly articulated enthusiasm for the absolutely retarded. George Tarleton writes in the introduction:

"Perhaps the first question that should be ddressed is the most obvious one, that being 'Why MODOK?'. The answer, however should be as obvious as the question. Just look at that guy. Do you not understand how amazing it is that someone decided that the most fearsome villain they could conceive is essentially a guy with a giant head who sits in a floating chair. This is genius, and the Journal of MODOK Studies exists specifically to point out this genius and celebrate MODOKery in all of its forms.

Grammatical mistakes have been reproduced as they appear in the original text for full effect.

Tarleton adopts the same writing style in his "The History of MODOK, Part One." The reader learns that MODOK stands for, "Mental Organism Designed Only for Killing," that his first appearance was in a fight with Captain America in Tales of Suspense #94 in which, "Captain America and MODOK trade threats for a while ("You are no match for MODOK") and MODOK talks about his amazing chair, which is apparently more agile than legs or something and then we get this pretty detailed lecture about the many different kinds of mind beams MODOK can use."

The rest of TJMS consists of the surprisingly gripping "Diary of MODOK's Pastry Chef" (I have seen the face of terror. I have seen MODOK), and the slightly disappointing MODOK-centric interview with Bob the Angry Flower creator Stephen Notley (JMS: When you drew MODOK in your strip, did you feel your personal urge to kill rising or subsiding? SN: No, my personal urge to kill remained low). Several artists, including Johnny Ryan and Devlin Thompson contribute MODOK pinups to round out what one hopes is the first of many issues. Again, Tarleton writes, "MODOK is really awesome, and this journal is only published because of this awesomeness, and not through any desire to make money from using Marvel Comics valuable copyrighted material."

Let's keep the love coming.