by Tim Seeley and Mike Norton. Published by Image Comics. Rated M for Mature. Third Printing, February 2015.
January 14, 2022
The first installation of the Revival: A Rural Noir series by Tim Seeley and Mike Norton takes place in the rural, snowy town of Wausau, Wisconsin. After a series of creepy happenings, Officer Dana Cypress is called onto the case, which is being led by her father, Sheriff Wayne Cypress. People across the town are reviving, which is to say they are coming back to life over and over again.
In his introduction to the trade paperback, Jeff Lemire poses the question, “What if the ones we love came back?” This is the question the series itself seems to beg. What is gained when our deceased rise again? And what, more importantly, do we sacrifice by letting them live?
All in all, Revival feeds into to the graphic noir tradition, packed with bloodshed and evocative plot twists that urge the reader onward. Despite this, however, I do find the constant jumps in place and time to be confusing. Plus, Dana and her sister Martha, also known as Em, look nearly identical so much so that the only true way
to tell them apart is by the clothes they are wearing. Too often, I had to remind myself of each sister’s storyline. (There is a scene where Dana is out of her officer attire, sitting at a bar. It took several panels for me to realize it wasn’t Martha.) This seems to be a fault, perhaps, in the way these women are drawn but also, I would argue, in the way their characters develop.
Both Dana and Martha are edgy and more than willing to fight for what they believe is right. Although I admire them both, I admit that they seem, by the end, to be one of the same. Maybe this is on purpose? I’m not sure; the story doesn’t actually provide any evidence for this presumption.
Additionally, I must address the ways Dana and Em, and all the females of this story, are drawn and characterized. Majority of the female characters are styled in the nude, partially nude, or placed in a submissive sexual position at some point. Examples of this abound, even for an elderly “reviver” who continues to appear as the narrative progresses.
Officer Dana, for instance, is shown shirtless, brushing her teeth in the bathroom, the moment we meet her. Soon after, there is an up-close shot of her unbuttoned uniform shirt over her cleavage. Once she arrives to the police station and grabs a doughnut from her colleague’s desk (which she immediately body-shames herself for), Officer Dana is disembodied: Seeley and Norton have cut off her head by way of outline to depict, I kid you not, her uniformed breast beside a collection of speech bubbles. In addition to all this, the blips of background media we get, such as a scene from Gone With the Wind on a grayish TV set and what seem to be old Playboy posters hung in a seedy garage, further conflict with Revival’s attempt at creating a story that is female-led.
I insist: Dana and Em are powerful and very much worth the reader’s attention. Yet, if they and others are consistently and subtly undercut by patriarchal indecencies, then what are Seeley and Norton really saying? I’ll tell you: “Sure, women can be cool and heroic, but also, let’s remember, we want to have sex with them and look at their boobies.”
So many scenes like this are repeated for the narrative’s women. May Tao, the junior reporter who works to gather clues of Wausau’s tightly-wound mystery, remains the only leading female character who is not sexualized. Even still, there is a scene at the end of the story that challenges this by placing her in a clichéd submissive position when she is (*spoiler alert*) captured by a pseudo-exorcist, motorcycle-riding d-bag.
When it comes to the BIPOC characters in Revival, there’s just three out of five who are not depicted in a problematic or stereotypical way: Dr. Ibrahaim Ramin, May Tao, and Ami, a woman from Ramin’s past. Otherwise, we are given
Choy and Mrs. Vang, two characters of Asian descent who both speak in broken English. At one point, Choy yells back at his neighbor, who accuses him of killing his farm animal, “I not have anything to do with [it]! I am good neighbor!”
I am influenced here by the anti-Asian and xenophobic realities that the Covid-19 pandemic has reintroduced our world to. I am reminded of the anti-Asian hate crimes that took place in several Atlanta spas. I am reminded of the students across our nation who are protesting, advocating for Asian-American literature courses at their Ivy League institutions. So: why does Choy speak in broken English? Why, too, is the only Black person featured in the narrative depicted rapping on a TV screen, which a white man is watching while jogging on a treadmill?
With all this in mind, I was extremely frustrated after I first read Revival. And, look, a story driven by white characters is, in the general sense, fine. Sometimes, though, I feel a narrative like this one ought to strive to be as anti-racist and feminist as possible, regardless of what sort of “truth” or “authenticity” it is after (assuming that is what Seeley and Norton might argue in defense of their racism and misogyny). But, I recognize that Seeley and Norton are attempting to paint the complicated world of a rural Wisconsin town, a place where casual racism is very much a reality for Choy and Mrs. Vang, and where, I assume, old white guys are fans of Black musicians and are in the habit of rapping along to their lyrics while working out.
Still, I can’t be the only one tired of BIPOC characters who are placed in stereotypical situations. This one is a mixed bag, I have to admit. (Already, I have edited this piece at least a dozen times, unsure of just what to make of it.)
I am not naïve enough to think by avoiding anti-feminist graphic novels I will solve anything. I admit, Revival has intrigue and an overall interesting concept. It nevertheless is a series I will choose not to follow; what good it does feature is not nearly enough to maintain my time and interest.
Sincerely, Mad Girl
Mad Girl Review 
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