Review: The Six Million Dollar Man #1
One of my favorite shows growing up was the Six Million Dollar Man. Lee Majors along with William Shatner and Clint Eastwood were heroes of mine. That’s why I’m very pleased to be holding this issue in my hands. Dynamite has done it again. They’ve taken a franchise that I’ve loved and thought I’d never see an original story for again and brought it back to life. The story opens with a bang as Steve is falling out of an airplane. He has to decide if this is real or is he dreaming? It’s real! After he breaks his fall using OSI ingenuity and with the help of a little voice in his head. He winds up severely damaged and in a hospital. After he’s well enough to move again he has to come to grips with what he’s been told and what has been revealed to him.
The Creative Team
Van Jenson opens this story with a hint of counter intelligence at play. Steve Austin learns a few secrets about the program that subsequently turned him into a bionic man and saved his life. Jenson brings Austin into a realm where he doesn’t know if he can trust the people, including Oscar Goldman and Rudy Wells, that he calls friends. Before this issue is over Steve will be on the run and fearing for his life. A great set-u for what could be a fine Six Million Dollar Man tale.
Ron Salas does a good job of re-creating the boyhood heroes I’ve come to know and love. His Steve Austin is definitely reminiscent of Lee Majors and the other characters are fleshed out well also. I really enjoyed the splash page which shows Col. Austin falling out of the plane which is itself falling apart. We see Austin frantically trying to regain his composure as he plummets towards the earth. Can his bionics save him? A great intro to an interesting book.
The Cover
The cover didn’t really do it for me. We see Austin in the upper right hand corner and he’s leaping. But it’s a very tiny picture of our protagonist and the rest is The Six Million Dollar Man Logo with the Fall of Man in jumbled letters. To the left reading sideways is dialog from the intro to the show: We can rebuild him. We have the technology. We can make him better than he was. Better, faster, stronger.
In Conclusion
The intro to this story is very satisfying. We see Steve survive a horrible plane crash and then has to recuperate. His Bionic limbs are up-graded and He discovers something he doesn’t like about the program that made him a bionic man. He wonders if he can truly trust the head of the OSI, Oscar Goldman. Can he trust anyone involved with the project? The climax to this issue see’s our hero in battle with a group of Ninja warriors. It’s bionics Vs. Martial Arts, great fun and a good build up to the next issue.
The Six Million Dollar Man #1
Writer: Van Jenson
Art: Ron Salas
Colors: Mike Atiyeh
Letters: Taylor Esposito
Cover: Ron Salas, David Ryan Robinson
About the Author
Kevin Given Kevin Given has studied with "Longridge Writers Group" and "Writer's Boot Camp" a speech/communications major from the University of Maine Presque-Isle/Orono sites. He has created the "Karl Vincent Vampire Hunter" franchise which includes 2 novels and 8 comic books. They can be found on amazon, Indyplanet and Kindle. For a limited time you can get digital copies of "Karl Vincent: Vampire hunter" #1 and "Files of Karl Vincent" #1 for free on Indyplanet. Kevin is producing the third novel in the series "Dracula Rising" (working title) and developing "Foul Blood" into comic book form.
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