Issue #3 is the half-way point in the mini-series of five total issues, and it ends up feeling more like filler than advancement. Little rising action or background on the kids or Plutona is given, and the relationship developments don’t feel true to established character.
Plutona #2 is a personal story, and Jeff Lemire and Emi Lenox give readers a raw perspective into the lead characters’ thought processes and reactions. They sound and react like scared kids with Ray being more rebellious while Diana is just freaked out and wants to tell her family, and Mie is the inquisitive one. Teddy seems like a passionate fanboy, but the final pages add intrigue to his character and set up issue 3 for some possible twists and turns. Plutona #2 is a comic about death, and it faces it head-on with Lemire, Lenox, and Bellaire showing the ups and downs of adolescence amplified in the face of tragedy with honest writing, intimate art, and timely colors.
Through vivid, approachable art from Emi Lenox, naturalistic and cutting dialogue from Jeff Lemire, idyllic colors from Jordie Bellaire, and letters from Steve Wands, whose level of boldness matches the characters’ volume level, Plutona #1 welcomes readers into its suburbia with a pinch of superheroics world. And they’ll want to stay because there is probably a little bit of Diana, Teddy, Ray, and/or Mie in each of them.
Set to release on Sept. 2 from Image Comics is Jeff Lemire and Emi Lenox’s Plutona, a miniseries about a rag-tag group of five kids who bump into the dead body of a famous superhero.
“The book isn’t so much about the superhero as it is the kids who find her. It’s about how this discovery, and the decision they make, starts to affect their lives and their friendship,” said writer Lemire via email interview. “It’s a very grounded story told from these kids’ point of view.”