Mini-series are always interesting to me. They have to have a strong concept, a stronger narrative and a rewarding conclusion that at the same time feels natural to the story progression of the series. Yet people think they’re easy to get right when in fact they’re difficult. The problem is that series like Ordinary come around and make it look easy. The creative team has deceived you because making this world work in just three issues and then delivering a rewarding conclusion was no small task. Michael has made his way to his son’s school only to be attached by the monster looking thing on the cover. The monster used to be a teacher and she views Michael as a threat. Thankfully his son Josh spots him and calls out to him. The teacher switches from wicked monster to judgmental teacher as she points out that Michael hasn’t been to any parent conferences. After thinks calm down we discover that Josh is transparent on one side of his body.
Our camera man head guy follows Michael back into the school and makes him an offer for an interview. He says he’ll help find Josh’s mom for an exclusive. Because he wants Josh to be happy he of course agrees, but they don’t find his mom. The interview of course reveals that there is one person in the world that wasn’t affected by the virus that has transformed everyone and now our Scottish scientist and the British government must save Michael’s life before the US government tries to kill him.
This is a very rewarding issue and conclusion to the series. The last several pages of the story are moving and heartfelt. Suddenly this quirky story that was funny and touching at the same time, it’s just deeply moving. Part of me even thinks that I missed just how serious this story was from the beginning, but one thing I didn’t miss was Michael’s character development. He is in no way shape or form the same person that he was in the beginning. It’s not that he’s changed; it’s that he’s stopped hiding his true self.
D’Israeli pulls on the heart-strings on those final pages. The body language and facial expressions paired with Josh’s innocence make for tremendous visual storytelling. D’Israeli also continues to craft interesting powers for characters. As Rob Williams said in our interview with him, the powers are supposed to reflect their inner self and nowhere is that more present then this issue and with D’Israeli’s artwork.
Over the past two months I have either read mini-series that missed the mark and had terrible endings or I have read mini-series that captured everything a mini-series is meant to be; Ordinary definitely falls into the latter of the two. You can trade wait on this one if you want to, but hopefully you’ve been following this powerful mini-series each month because it’s worth your time and money.
Score: 5/5
Writer: Rob Williams Artist: D’Israeli Publisher: Titan Comics Price: $3.99 Release Date: 7/23/14 Format: Mini-Series, Print/Digital