DC’s ‘Plunge’ is No Routine Dive
Debuting in February under DC’s Black Label (for readers age 17 and older), comic book writer/creator Joe Hill proudly released his latest effort, Plunge. Hill is best known as the mastermind behind the best-selling Locke & Key series, which is now a popular Netflix series. Plunge offers up a very different feel from its mainstream predecessor, though there is no less suspense in this nautical adventure. At two issues in, things are ramping up in this superbly paced story.
The artwork of Plunge is a tag-team effort drawn by Stuart Immonen (Captain America) and Dan McDaid (Basketful of Heads). While both of these gentlemen offer up some impressive work in this series, I cannot help but emphasize it is the writing that steals the show here. Hill’s work is a wonderful encapsulation of the dreadful and spooky, which is something that came through in Locke & Key, but is arguably more pronounced here.
As the story sets up, a tsunami strikes causing a significantly high death toll. In the aftermath of all this, a science vessel from the early 1980’s suddenly turns up as it intermittently emits a distress signal. What only confounds the matter is the fact that this ship went down decades ago without a trace of any survivors. A team of salvage divers and their ship is soon dispatched to investigate the recently surfaced mystery and things slowly get twisted from there.
Character development is one of the many strong points of Plunge. There is a very diverse crew that become the focal point of the book and each member is quickly though not haphazardly brought into the fray. It is done in such a way that you begin to connect with these people rather soon as opposed to characters being rapidly introduced without much of a feel of personality.
So with all of that in mind, Plunge comes as a highly recommended read. If this haunting adventure can manage to keep this kind of pace in the months to come, this is one title that could find its way to many ‘best of the year’ lists by the time 2020 comes to a close. Eisner Award, anyone?
