Review: DC/ HEROES Graphic Novel Hard Cover

REVIEW: HEROES VOLUME I Graphic Novel Hard Cover
11/7/07
© By: David Deas www.the-owi.com

So I get a knock at the door today and I open it to find the DC Hard Cover for
the HEROES graphic novels sitting on my doorstep.

First impressions: make room for this in your collection. You have seen the cover previously with the Alex Ross artwork on the front and Isaac's (Tim Sale's) painting of Peter flying off the rooftop on the reverse. Also if you remove the dust cover the eclipse is embossed into the books cover, that is a classy touch.

Now if you have read the online graphic novels the majority of this book isn't new to you. Even still it is nice to have them in hand on glossy paper. There is a disconnect in reading them online and it is nice to run your fingers across the page.

You can tell that this book was designed by people who live and work in graphic novels. The opening page is a reference to HEROES' comic book origins. It is a full page comic book cover with a familiar painting of a cheerleader running from a shadow. Even the 'Helix Comics' logo puts you into the mindset of a 10 year old who just spent 12 cents on the comic of the week.

If that isn't enough the next few pages follow suit and the titles, writers and artists are contained in old comic book style advertising boxes. They even have the classic X-Ray glasses ad in there. Whoever came up with this idea wins my award for creativity in book design.

Included is a very nice introduction titled 'Jump, Magazine, Sunday.' from Masi Oka (Hiro Nakamura) which speaks about his upbringing and the impact that Manga (Japanese comics) have had on his personal life. In Masi's own words, "A mere television show couldn't contain us. There still are more stories to tell, that we wanted to tell but couldn't..."

As stated earlier the novels are all from Volume I. They start with Mohinder's search for his father's body in 'Monsters' and end with 'The Death of Hana Gitelman'. In between each novel is one of Tim Sale's paintings turned into a 9th Wonders cover. All of Tim Sale's work from Volume I is included throughout the book. It is so great to have Sale's work on paper.

The surprise to me was the interview conducted by Jeph Loeb, Executive Producer of HEROES, with writers Aron Eli Coliete and Joe Pokaski. If you follow the weekly Behind the Eclipse interviews at Comic Book Resources you will recognize their names.

They talk about the process of creating a weekly online graphic novel and the impetus for such a project. It was a nice read and makes one realize how much work goes on to produce not only the TV show but the rest of the HEROES universe.

I would recommend this book to everyone. The novice HEROES fan would get a lot of background out of the novels and the hardcore collector gets a great collection of artwork from many different comic artists with varied styles. I am not sure where you could find a collection of art like this anywhere else. This would even be a great present for anyone who is a comic collector but not necessarily a HEROES fan.

I would like to thank everyone that worked on this book. It took a lot of handwork and boy does it show. I would also like to thank Alex from DC Comics who gave me the opportunity to get my hands on the book and do this review.

HEROES VOLUME I Hard Cover
DC Comics/ NBC
$29.99 US retail