Is this latest franchise from Joe’s Comics a must own?  Read on to find out.

The official description from Image:

Flyboy finds himself increasingly under the seductive spell of one of the Moonglow Twins, who leaves no memory of her actions the next morning.  Driven by a subconscious memory of their dangerous affair, and by his abject failure to get anyone in his home town to take him seriously, Flyboy decides to leave behind his current heroic identity and reinvent himself as a totally different hero in another part of the country.  But everything that can go wrong, does go wrong, and he must face an even more humiliating defeat before the eyes of the world.

There’s a lot of room in life to re-invent yourself, but can the same be said for a sidekick?  That’s the question on our protagonist’s mind and in a world that lost an icon, the creative team works together to deliver an answer.

Considering all that’s going on around the narrative, scribe J. Michael Straczynski yields a tale that fills in some gaps and offers some hope but plenty of despair.  Hijacking and taking advantage of human weakness, the author allows the birth of the Bullet, but a sparkling avenue for a man plagued by demons is short lived.  There’s depth here to be sure, and it’s appreciated, but there were sequences where I felt that the text simply got in the way of the momentum, resulting in a somewhat sluggish pace.

Tom Mandrake dazzles as he turns in his best work to date.  Using consistent design choices he continues to build a familiar atmosphere that embraces the seedier side of life.  I found the panels themselves to be slightly simplistic but well crafted, as details gave birth to some painful moments.  I’ll be honest, I’m hard pressed to find anything wrong here so the only complaint I can levy is that I wish I had a few more pages to marvel at.

Sidekick #3 is a potent addition to the franchise that continues to develop our protagonist and his growing list of problems.  Recommended.

4/5