One of Top Cow’s core franchise is back, what does it have to say with all the change that has occurred since it first started?

Written by Matt Hawkins and Bryan Edward Hill

Illustrated and Colored by Atilio Rojo

Lettered by Troy Peteri

TO PROTECT THE FUTURE, WHAT WILL WE BECOME? The classic series returns in a reimagining overseen by creator MARC SILVESTRI. In a modern world where humanity is defined by the technology it creates, a terrorist strikes at the heart of human progress. One of the few survivors of the attack is a man named Morgan Stryker. Mortally wounded, Stryker’s life is saved by his employers…but the price could be his humanity itself.

Is this a reboot? “Cyberforce” has already had a rebirth. That and questions like it pop up whenever a new #1 for a series happens. Technically, this new series isn’t a hard reset of prior continuity, according to co-writer Matt Hawkins from various interviews such as the one reprinted in the back from “Image +.” During the events of “IXth Generation,” something happened that allows this (and theoretically the other relaunched core Top Cow properties) to exist in sync with prior series. But none of that really matters, you don’t need to have prior experience with this property to pick up this new story. Which is one of the things this first issue gets right, it focuses on telling a story over reestablishing mythology and minutia. Veteran readers and fans of cyberpunk will obviously pick up on recurring ideas this property is built on. Overall, this is about as fresh a start a property as old as “Cyberforce” can expect.

As for it as a 20-page comic, co-writers Matt Hawkins and Bryan Edward Hill and artist Atilio Rojo do about as good job as can be expected for these parameters. Hawkins has always struck me as a writer who is excellent at developing a scenario and structure, while the character stuff can be a bit rougher. Hill does excellent character work as seen in series like “Postal.” Their first issue reads like a strong meshing of each writers strengths as “Cyber Force” begins reconstruction. The issue rightly places emphasis squarely on the relationship between its two leads, the father daughter duo of Morgan and Carin Stryker, in the aftermath of a terror attack that leaves Morgan in pieces and Carin with terrible choices to make. There are some plot elements, such as a name for the e-corp Morgan runs security for that turns him into a cyborg. However, such world building and macguffery can both come later, and any lack will not really matter so long as the emotional through line for this story is clear and understandable. It’s never a bad decision to flesh out character first.

Artist Atilio Rojo illustrations give this new “Cyber Force” series the fleeting sense of history often found in the cybernetic subject. Rojo’s artwork is in tune with the visual language developed artists like Marc Silvestri and Kohi Pham, but is distanced from it by the influence that technology, and design in general, has been by a decade plus of Apple dominance. His character design and overall aesthetic is smoother compared to the gratuitous detail from previous artists. Morgan Stryker is still very much a beefy cyberman, this time his mechanical appendages look more organic than they’ve ever been. The color pallet is bold, vibrant, compared to slowly muddying earth tones of the prior series. It almost looks too artificial despite the painterly application. While his forms and design are fairly representational, the pallet creates a bit of cartooned distance and harkens back to the hyper-everything of the franchises early days. His art isn’t nearly as conflicted as the view of technology in these stories, but that friction with the past feels right at home within a cyborg story like this.

There is still that ’90s Image root to this comic, the issues features four separate splashes. Most of which are quite effective. The double page spread fully reveals the robot-human-thing that shatters Morgan and kills everyone else uses a ridiculous low angle morphs the world, and reads like classic Image updated with modern tools. That use of perspective is why one spread, the explosion of a not-Microsoft building, didn’t land nearly as well as the rest. Despite the obvious energy involved and clever page turn crescendo, it was a bit flat.

Continued below

How technology changes us, is one of the core themes of cyberpunk and cyborg theory. It is a question that seems to get louder and more relevant as yet another Facebook scandal erupts. “Cyber Force” #1 begins to foreground these motifs through the bodies of the Strykers. There are some moments of dialog gesturing in that direction — the doctor who did this to him notes Morgan’s rage after he wakes up is perfectly natural, “he woke up a different man,” — but it is visually, through Atilio Rojo’s art, that most of these ideas are first expressed. In his rage, Morgan shakes his new metallic arm at the sky bellowing “what did you do to me?!” Reenacting various melodramatic moments of men angry with God. Technological progress has come to much to fast for Morgan. In dealing with this sudden change, this rendition of Morgan Stryker takes an noteworthy turn from the other beefy cybermen he looks like. Rojo draws him with a surprising amount of emotive range in this first issue. It is all melodramatic in scale going from smashing anger to submissive depression.(Rojo in general does a fine job capturing emotion in the eyes of his characters.) Showing that kind of vulnerability is an interesting twist to the hard bodied masculinity characters like him are drawn from. Showing that range also helps to sell the feeling of a slowly growing detached ambivalence as the issue reaches its emotional climax.

Rojo’s representation of the Strykers beautifully captures the simultaneous loving-fearful position technology holds in these kinds of stories. It’s a dichotomy represented by the two Strykers, Morgan, and Carin. Carin is wheelchair bound, in her case technology aids her to achieve movement. While the wheelchair is comparatively analog, it is hard to separate a character like Charles Xavier from it such is it’s symbolic proto-cybernetic value. In this case technology has proven to be a net positive. Morgan is similarly, if more extensively, aided by technology, but is now repulsed and questions his own humanity. And now they have come together to work through their feelings, together. It will be worth keeping an eye on how theirs and others bodies morph as the run continues.

Final Verdict: 7.5 – “Cyber Force” #1 is a strong first step to the new series. It rightly places the focus on the characters and uses them to deftly begin developing some of it’s core themes and motifs for the new run.