Steve Niles and Tony Harris deliver a story of Eliot Ness and strange supernatural forces. On the surface it’s nothing more than a standard supernatural detective story, but it looks to hold much more behind this initial idea.
Chin Music #1
The first five pages are nothing more than a man silently cleaning his revolver and etching an inscription into bullets. It’s after this that the story flashes back to Egypt where two beings are fighting. After a chase, one is stripped down to his bones and left to die, only to be discovered by Ness. Ness helps transport him to the hospital, only to have him seemingly explode on the way. Cut back to the present, where a much transformed Ness is seen loading a gun before we cut to meeting with Al Capone and his peers that ends in a bad way for Capone.
Chin Music #1
Niles had roughly half the book as silent pages. Nothing more than the characters taking certain actions, with only sound effects to punctuate the actions. This shows great faith in Harris’ storytelling ability, but also puts a lot of weight on the silent actions. Niles sets up the story as a supernatural detective story, but it seems to be more. There’s an unknown power in the mix, and little is revealed about it. Little, in general, is revealed. This issue really doesn’t do much in the way of telling a story, but rather sets one up and builds a lot of mystery. This, understandably, could be frustrating and off putting to some. Though, if the story pays off as it should, this mystery will be worth it.
Chin Music #1
Harris was given a lot of freedom and responsibility in telling the story, and it worked well. Many of the pages are nothing more than his art and nothing is lost there. The unique page layouts also were a nice touch. The way the panels were bordered and set within one another really helped to establish a concrete flow across the page and the story was better for it.
Though this issue can easily frustrate a reader, it is worth the effort. There is much to be seen here in this new story, and having a bit of mystery is well worth it.
