Brandon Borzelli's Geek Goggle Reviews

Big Man Plans #1-4Big Man Plans #1-4
Image Comics
Powell & Weisch

Every so often I find a comic book that I describe as a punch in the gut. Usually they turn out to be terrific, but difficult reads. "Big Man Plans" is a four-issue mini-series that is one of the more unique punches in the gut I've ever read. This is not a comic book for everyone. It contains graphic content, violence and deals in some very heavy themes. However, if like your comics to get your blood pumping a little faster then this is for you. If you pick this book up I think you are going to end up loving it, but also feeling drained upon completing it. I highly recommend this mini-series.

"Big Man" is a little person. The comic mini is told in a non-linear fashion. When focused on the origin of Big Man we see a kid that is picked on and seems to be scorned by a mother that has an elitist attitude that takes a big hit when her son is born a little person. However, Big Man is not without his allies.

Big Man and his father are close. He learns a ton of lessons from his father on the farm, but more importantly he receives unconditional love. He also has a sister that gets caught in the crossfire when the family falls apart. A lot of these elements seem fairly cliché and they are. However, the execution of these scenes are heart wrenching and very effective to pull the reader down in the dirt with Big Man.

The familiar situations continue as Big Man ends up in an orphanage. No one wants to adopt a little person and of course all of the other kids pick on him. Eventually he finds his way into the Army. However, he can't join up in the regular ranks.

Big Man gets picked for a secret team of soldiers that have the duty to crawl through the rat holes in Vietnam and kill the enemy before they can spring their trap on the regular GIs. Big Man excels at this mission. Not only that, but he begins to bend the world to his will, in some cases against his fellow soldier when he doesn't agree with their methods.

At this point, Big Man is heading down a dark path that matches the difficult upbringing. He adorns a necklace of digits and appendages from his kills down in the holes.

After the Vietnam War he returns home to not much. He seems to excel in fighting and does so with some regularity. However, he receives a letter (in the opening issue) that puts him on the bloody path of revenge, but the motive and source of the letter aren't revealed until the final issue of the mini-series.

The series is fantastic. The book moves at a fast pace, dances around the timeline as it pieces together some of the origin story with some of the bloody revenge trail in the current time. The comic book doesn't present any heroes. All of the characters have flaws and they all seem to partake or make decisions that come back to haunt them. The book is dirty. It looks dirty, the characters are dirty and it does its best to make the reader feel dirty.

There are components that may not work for every reader. Things are introduced but never fully dealt with, such as the sister or how he ended up with an on-the-books unit while he was an off-the-books soldier in Vietnam. Things like that are not explained or expanded upon much. If they were then this would be a much longer series and that would take away from the pace. I prefer the series to be short in length so these nagging questions don't really enter my mind much beyond wondering about them at the conclusion.

Another potential drawback is the graphic nature of the comic. In some ways, this comic goes beyond shock-value images. I can easily see how someone could read this and think that this comic is trying too hard to get a rise out of the reader. That some of the images could have been more suggestive instead of graphic. For me, showing the content was more effective because the lead character just keeps taking hits and giving them right back throughout life. It seems like each confrontation takes on another level of revenge. To be sure, this book is not for the queasy.

Brandon Borzelli's Geek Goggle ReviewsThe artwork is breathtaking in a powerful and awful kind of way. Characters getting sliced in half, getting lit on fire and some other fairly bloody scenes. There is a grittiness to the line work that brings a darkness to the story that punctuates the character work. However, during the softer moments, when hope is creeping into Big Man's life, the artwork presents the lead character with a level of innocence that the art pulls off nicely. The comic book is a great visual book and not something you will find just in any other comic.

"Big Man Plans" is a four-issue mini-series that is well worth the time and money to read. The comic is a grim look into how life keeps hitting the little person, known as Big Man, again and again. The book takes a powerful revenge story and wraps it in a horrifying origin story with a touch of love sprinkled in. The series is extremely good and if you don't mind a little graphic content then I urge you to pick this up.

5 out of 5 Geek Goggles