Comic Book Review: Echo #9 |

Echo #9
Written by Terry Moore
Illustrated by Terry Moore
Published by Abstract Studios
Reviewed by Joseph Copeli

The Story: When a nuclear detonation occurred in the sky over Moon Lake, Julie Martin was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Millions of fragments of an experimental suit rained down from the sky, and the pieces that struck Julie and her truck merged to form an unmovable breastplate on her chest. Now HeNRI, developers of the suit, will stop at nothing to find Julie and get the remains of their suit back.

The Recap: The homeless man with the other piece of the suit has tracked Julie to the motel in Nevada. After killing the bikers protecting Julie, he aims to kill Dillon. Julie uses her piece of the suit to deflect the energy and blasts him miles away. Julie and Dillon take off immediately and Agent Raven investigates the fight at the motel.

This Issue: Julie has a dream that resembles Annie’s death. Dillon and Julie camp out in the desert while Agent Raven interviews a waitress who saw them at a diner. Pam Martin has a nightmare about her sister Julie.
Not much happens in the way of plot this issue of Echo, written and drawn by Terry Moore, but that just illustrates the feature of this book that sets it apart from most superhero/scifi books: it takes its time getting where it’s going. Some fans might complain that this is yet another example of “deflated comics,” where little happens while cover prices keep going up. Luckily, that view doesn’t apply to this series, at least to the attentive reader.

This particular issue introduces barely anything new, instead focusing on things that have happened before. The dream sequence in the beginning shows a naked Julie flying through the sky in jubilation before being chased by black demons that eventually catch up to her and engulf her in blackness. The entire sequence mirrors the final moments of Annie’s life almost exactly. We already know the suit feels like a second skin, explaining why Julie was naked. The black demons are the missiles fired at Annie. A few issues ago, Julie suddenly uttered Annie’s name, even though she never knew her. Julie’s dream sequence indicates that there is a definite connection between the previous wearer of the suit and the current wearer. It is not clear yet how or why Julie seems to have access to some of Annie’s memories: could it be that the suit’s symbiotic nature is connected to the consciousness of the wearer as well? Does the homeless man get these memories as well? Is it this psychic connection that aids him in tracking Julie so precisely? I can’t wait for these questions to be answered.

One thing Terry Moore is known for is his characterization. Instead of forcing the plot to move forward, he allows the characters to develop and the story to move at its own pace. The bond between Dillon and Julie strengthens this issue. He is surprised at her ability to find North using the stars and she is impressed with his philosophy about not destroying things that can’t be replaced, a view she appears to share with him (based on comments by her ex-husband a few issues back about how she wouldn’t even kill flies). Since Moore is quite good at developing complex relationships between his characters, it would seem that the nature of Julie and Dillon’s relationship will continue to grow and change.

On Ivy’s side of things, she learns little from the waitress she interviews about Julie and Dillon’s whereabouts. Much more interesting is her response to the waitress’s statement that Julie smelled nice; she says, “Like gardenias.” As an investigator, Agent Raven’s knowledge of this is not necessarily significant, but there have been details scattered through the series so far that make it seem that there is something else going on. Agent Raven was surprised by what she found in a box in Julie’s closet and took the time to smell her bed sheets. At the motel, she took the time again to smell the sheets and apparently sighed with pleasure. Her intimacy with the object of her investigation may just be an obsessive side effect of the job, but it’s more likely that she is developing some kind of infatuation with Julie.

If one dream sequence wasn’t enough, Moore included a second one this issue. This time, we see a young Julie playing outside with a young Pam Martin in front of a house (I could be mistaken, but Pam’s doll looks like a plush Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Waterson). In the distance, a nuclear bomb explodes, destroying the house and incinerating Pam and their mother. Only a disheveled Julie is left standing in a pile of dust with the bones of her sister in front of her. The big surprise is that it is Pam having this dream. When Julie visited Pam in issue #3, Pam told Julie that she dreamt of her flying over mushrooms, which could mean mushroom clouds. The dream in this issue seems to be related. More ominous are the other details Pam related during that meeting: that she saw Pam flying that “falling” will cause everyone to die.

For a seemingly uneventful issue, there is a lot to think about. Even though the plot didn’t move forward, other details were added or expounded upon. This slow but steady buildup of sub-plots and characters, coupled with Terry Moore’s clean and evocative art, make for a series that is a pleasure to savor slowly.