Black Hammer, Volume 1: Secret Origins Review (Jeff Lemire, Dean Ormston)

Superheroes are transported to a mysterious farm and get new identities for no reason - and that’s Black Hammer! 

You know what this title needs? A STORY! This first volume is all table-setting which is mostly why it’s so unsatisfying. Jeff Lemire and Dean Ormston introduce their Golden Age superheroes, all of whom are derivative knockoffs of more famous characters: Abraham Slam (Captain America), Colonel Randall Weird (Doctor Strange), Talky-Walky (a generic robot), Mark Marz/Barbalien (J’onn J’onzz/Martian Manhunter), Golden Gail (Mary Marvel), Madame Dragonfly (Madame Xanadu), Black Hammer (Steel), and the big bad, Anti-God (The Anti-Monitor). 

Fair enough - so does this mean Lemire has a new take on superheroes or a fresh commentary/subversive interpretation of these characters, like a 21st century Watchmen? Nope! It’s a bad soap opera full of depressives instead. Gail’s acting out at school because she’s a 55 year old in a kid’s body. She’s also secretly in love with Barbalien who’s in love with the local Catholic priest. Abraham’s giving it to the Sheriff’s ex. Broadly speaking, a couple of them are listlessly trying to figure out a way back to wherever they came from but the main “story” of this book is a dinner they all have with the waitress! What the hell, Jeff Lemire?! 

The title character appears in one scene - one! - so it’s completely unclear why Black Hammer is seemingly so important. As the subtitle suggests, most of the book is about relating the origins of each character, the majority of which were tired, unimpressive and rushed though Col. Weird’s one was ok - the “doorways in time” were a clever storytelling device. Dean Ormston’s art is pretty cool too. 

There are the tiniest of seeds of interesting ideas but, my word, the pacing is too damn slow! At this rate it’ll be three or four books deep before any semblance of a plot appears and I didn’t get nearly enough from this first book to make me want to keep reading any further. Black Hammer, Volume 1: Secret Origins is a terrible, tedious, glacially-paced pseudo-superhero comic about nothing - not recommended!