Score:
★★★★1/2 (4.5/5)
The 'American Vampire' team is back together again with a thrilling post-apocalyptic tale set in the 50s. Scott Snyder and Rafael Albuquerque along with colorist Marcelo Maiolo present an intriguing period piece during the height of the arms race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. With people in fear of a nuclear war, the government stressed preparation for such an event with duck and cover drills. The Cold War and the Red Scare were part of life and in 'Duck and Cover' Snyder captures that hysteria with great detail while also telling a coming-of-age story of teenager Delmont Reeves whose love of filmmaking and hate of high school bullies has him anticipating graduation and leaving for Hollywood once and for all.
Unfortunately, the threat of a bomb attack becomes all too real, and the lives of everyone in the town of Schellville are changed forever. Snyder unabashedly invokes some of the nostalgic execution of a Steven Spielberg film when establishing Delmont's backstory of discovering his love of movies and moviemaking. In fact, he also invokes Spielberg's 'War of the Worlds.' And as familiar as all that sounds, Snyder adds enough nuance and surprises to make this thriller his own. It also doesn't hurt to have the artistic prowess of Rafael Albuquerque and Marcelo Maiolo.
Like Spielberg, Snyder needs a great cinematographer to bring his vision to fruition. Few artists have the cinematic vision of Albuquerque who's talented enough to handle the emotional weight and arc the characters go through in issue one. There's never a boring panel. Each one is designed to inform the scene while balancing past and present events masterfully. Maiolo heightens these dynamic designs with colors that differentiate the flashbacks from the present as well as what's a film and what's reality. The stunning light from a drive-in screen illuminates the action in a realistic way while the explosions to follow drown the characters in the pits of a hell-like landscape. The virtuosity on display is magnificent.
'Duck and Cover' takes familiar coming-of-age stories into harrowing new territory. Snyder combines nostalgia, fear, violence, and catastrophe into a compelling new thriller. Albuquerque and Maoilo bring it all to vivid life in all its frightening ugliness. This historical retelling of the age of the atomic bomb is a gripping read that draws the reader in with a well-worn set-up and then turns the story on its head. A fantastic debut issue.
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