The Good
THE MOVEMENT wastes no time diving into action, and there's certainly a lot of it packed into this issue. Infighting within the team leads to an easy transition to two separate angles of the same search for the Cornea Killer, and that translates to double the action.
The team is truly diverse, not just in appearance and powers, but in motivation and political ideology. It's nice to see the book breaking free of its marketing and pre-release reputation; rather than shoehorning the members of The Movement into "Occupy-ers in superhero costumes" (which, while interesting, has pretty limited story potential), the creators have given us a fledgling team with worldviews and attitudes that run the entire spectrum. I can't wait to see what kind of storm Rainmaker (previously of Gen 13) brings to the team.
And it's truly a team book -- every character is important, every character has a voice, and they all have to deal with each other. Gail Simone does an incredible job of communicating the dynamics of her cast's relationships in a short space; the team is as new to us as the series, but their loyalties (and tensions) are easy to spot.
The Bad
I enjoy characters with depth, and I appreciate that the lines between hero, antihero, and villain can get blurred sometimes, but some of their actions are making it difficult to like the members of The Movement. There are a lot of opposing feelings to reconcile -- like despising the two police officers for being creepy/corrupt yet thinking the team's capture and violent retaliation is crossing a line -- and while these conflicts of conscience can be used to great effect, I feel like they're more powerful once characters are more familiar and their motivations are known. Throwing them into moral grey areas right out of the gate makes it seem like the cast doesn't have a handle on what they're doing (and maybe that's intentional, but it makes them harder to sympathize with). It's a weird space to be in -- I want to root for this ragtag bunch of kids who just want to make a difference in their city, but I can't wait for the growing pains to be over.
And...I'm just not into Mouse. I know he's meant to be comic relief of sorts, but rats creep me out, and my stomach turned a bit during his contribution to the war council meeting.
The Verdict
This series is getting traction, and -- pardon the pun -- moving forward quite quickly. It's on track to be a very interesting book with a unique set of heroes (and problems) and plenty of action. We've only begun to see the extent of this team's powers, and I suspect there will be some big surprises as we get to know more about The Movement. The characters are still growing into their roles, and are sometimes hard to sympathize with, but it's intriguing enough that I want to see what happens next.