Few pairs of heroes draw my attention, I must admit. It’s not that I don’t see the value of a good buddy-cop dynamic, it’s just that the focus is often skewed toward one or the other, and it’s usually the one I don’t like as much. Example, “Cable and Deadpool” (probably my favorite pairing ever) gave me exactly the right amount of Cable, but not nearly enough of the merc with a mouth. And that was an excellent implementation of the two-character dynamic. Needless to say, that made me hesitant to pick up my first “Cloak and Dagger” issue, and that was (to be completely and totally honest) only because it had “Spider Island” on the cover.
“Cloak and Dagger: Spider Island” is the first in a three-part mini-series that is meant to tie into the Dan Slott powered “Amazing Spider-Man” event of the same name. Nick Spencer takes the back-story of the heroic pair and compresses it into a beautifully arranged first three pages that plays on the duality of their relationship. Their history as runaways is narrated by inverted thought boxes, Cloak’s being black with white and Dagger’s the reverse. The most striking (and revealing) aspect was the back-and-forth between them in this initial segment. The thought boxes are ever-present, providing fascinating sub-text. Emma Rios’s interweaving of the two tonal schemes (again, darkness for Cloak and brightness for Dagger) mirror the nature of the duo. They struggle with complex and painful histories and a complicated romantic interaction. The insecurity of Cloak (as presumed by Dagger) and the youthful naivety and reliance on authority of Dagger (projected on her by Cloak) is beautifully rendered by both print and paint. Much of the issue eschews traditional paneling in favor of a dark force-dimensional swirling and blending that just feels right. It’s not “Cloak. And Dagger.”, it’s “Cloak and Dagger,” and this style perfectly represents just how much their lives are entwined (with the ‘paneling’) and yet distinctly separate (represented by the color-schemes).
This barely felt like a “Spider Island” issue, which sounds negative, but is in fact high praise. Reading this issue felt more like I was reading something of monumental importance and which I would be interested in as a standalone that just HAPPENED to be during “Spider Island.” Let’s face it: at this point, Dan Slott doesn’t need any help telling the story of radioactive bed bugs, and Spencer does a fantastic job involving his characters in those events without making them just a tacked-on addition. Plus, Cloak and Dagger have more on their plate than an island full of arachnids. A familiar foe is lurking in the shadows, and the role this villain (that’s right, no gendered pronouns) will play is as yet unknown.
While I’m more excited about the next “Amazing Spider-Man” (and let’s face it, how could anyone not be excited about that?), there is DEFINITELY room in anyone’s reading list for one of the best-executed starts to a tie-in mini-series that I have ever read; especially the kind of series about a seemingly cookie-cutter pair of heroes. Cloak and Dagger is anything but the expected, and is nothing short of worth the time.
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