Bionic Man #13 Review

Building upon the last issue, The Bionic Man #13 adds greater depth to the title’s mythos. It also goes places where the originally TV show couldn’t, for practicality or financial reasons. Case in point? Cyborg Bigfoot.

The official description from Dynamite:

The Secret of Bigfoot deepens! After narrowly escaping death, Steve is forced to go a second round with the legendary monster. But how can he survive against such a formidable foe when his bionic body is under attack from within?

The one potential problem I have with this issue is the opening. Last issue saw Steve Austin minus an arm. Yet, by the first couple of pages, his arm is fixed and back. I understand hes a cyborg (sorry.. “bionic”) but this doesn’t give the character much to risk in a fight if its that easy to repair.

Of course this is only a minor complaint as the rest of the title is fairly action packed and interesting. Bigfoot makes another appearance, this time leading to a second encounter between the fabled monster and Austin. Whilst I appreciate the take on the creature; having been operated on by Russian scientists, it doesn’t yet explain who Bigfoot is. They operated on Bigfoot.. but why was he in Russia? Maybe hes an augmented gorilla or something, but this hasn’t been made clear yet.

However, the character is also given more depth in this issue, including a sense of emotion and understanding. Without spoiling the plot, the title does its best to show a very real human side to the ‘monster’. This is something that’s shown to often be at the heart of Bionic Man; the amalgamation of man and machine. This fight between emotion and logic has been shown before, but the introduction of a more primitive example certainly makes things more interesting without being obviously patronizing or cliched.

Ultimately, however, not everything goes to plan. Without spoiling the story, again, there is a certain cliffhanger near the end that certainly changes the scope of things, making for an interesting plot. The political and ethical aspects of Bionic Man are often overlooked (is Steve Austin a man or government property, for example) , but its good to see they might not have been forgotten.