Hero by Night #1

Creator: DJ Coffman
Platinum Studios Comics, 32 pages, color, $2.99
So? Another fun take on the superhero genre, though Coffman takes a slightly different route and ends up with an upbeat tale that’s easy to like. Story begins in 1956, with the final showdown between Hero by Night and his archvillain, the Iron Talon. Jump ahead to the present, and young slacker Jack King has taken over as super of an apartment building owned by his father. In its basement, he finds a hidden passageway to the headquarters of the original Hero by Night. His first thought is to sell the hero’s old journal and equipment on eBay, but as the last page shows that won’t be as easy as he thinks. Jack is a likable character (though I would like to see a moratorium on creators putting characters who look like or are named after Jack Kirby in their comics – this one has both) and the art is warm, effective and appealing in a slightly cartoony way. The book benefits greatly from its previous existence online, where Coffman has created more than 200 pages of the original Hero by Night’s journal. That gives this story enough confidence to work on its own terms and without feeling like it’s as much a copy of the medium’s more famous and more serious superheroes. Grade: B+