RESURRECTION MAN was this great little cult book created by Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning which debuted back in 1997. Mitch Shelley has this very cool power: every time he dies, he resurrects with a new power. He's been taken down by the best of them, including HITMAN and his constant foils the Body Doubles. The book was never a big seller, only enduring 27 issues plus a 1,000,000 issue, and truly developed a major cult status. People who loved the book spoke at length about it while those who didn't equally trashed it. Now Mitch Shelley is back as part of the NEW 52.
The book begins with Mitch about ready to be cut up in the local morgue. But, as the title says, he's Resurrection Man and he's back. Mitch steals an ATM card and proceeds to jump on a plane. While there, he scopes out the fellow passengers and strikes up a conversation with the woman next to him, who claims her name is Sue and has a teardrop tattoo on her right cheek.. Sue proceeds to create tales about the other passengers and why they're on this plane to Portland.
Midway through the flight, Sue stands up and transforms into some kind of demon, telling Mitch his soul is overdue. The hull gets breached, the sky marshal gets killed and Mitch and Sue take their battle outside. Mitch uses his magnetic field powers to zap the villain and in the process, gets sucked into the plane's engine. Mitch dies, the plane crashes and everyone on board dies with him.
The difference: Mitch comes back to life. this time, he flows like water.
Meanwhile, two women are questioning and executing folks in the coroner's office who won't tell them about the John Doe who obviously got up and walked away. And, during all of this, a "firefighter" named Suriel, who has a teardrop tattoo on his right cheek, carries on a conversation with a mysterious woman on the other end of a cell phone connection. He mentions that he thinks the "basement office" is interested in Mitch too. The woman on the phone turns a tarot card and it's the Resurrection man. The woman is Madame Xanadu.
Yeah...this books rocks! It's full of twists and turns and, if you're a fan of the original books, you'll be wondering how Mitch dies and what he'll be next time. Looks like we've got angels looking for him and maybe some of Satan's legions. And Madame Xanadu in the middle of it all? Cool!
Abnett and Lanning know this character well and I love their work on pretty much everything they have done in the last 15 years for both DC and Marvel. Their dialogue is cool without being corny and their expositionary work is just enough without being too heavy handed. Fernando Dagnino's artwork is very reminiscent of Jackson Guice's work on the original series. His atmospheric lines just further in the making this a rather creepy book. Truly can't wait to see where issue #2 and beyond takes us.
Give this one a try, even if you never picked up the old series. You can pretty much figure what's going on without knowing a ton of back story.
BTW: the hooded woman is hiding behind a tree right after Mitch resurrects following the plane crash.
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