R.I.P.D., also known as the Rest in Peace Department, is a trade collection of the original miniseries written in 2000 by Peter M. Lenkov with Lucas Mrangon and Randy Emberlin handling the art. The series had previously been collected in 2003, but since a movie is coming out starring Ryan Reynolds and Jeff Bridges later this summer, Dark Horse has decided to re-release the trade in hopes of building up anticipation for the film. Is R.I.P.D. an instant classic worthy of your time and money, or is it just a story you’ve heard a thousand times before? The answer: a little bit of both.
As I’ve written before, you don’t need to be innovative to tell a great story or create a great product. Hell, Jim Sterling just did a video on that topic in video games, and every point he made there can apply to all forms of creative media. The story Lenkov tells isn’t all that original. Our protagonist, Nick Cruz, is a cop trying to clear drugs off the street when he ends up being murdered in cold blood by something that seemed to expect he was coming. He signs a deal that allows him to return to earth to track down and seek revenge on his killer, but in return, he must work for 100 years in the R.I.P.D., which essentially serves as God’s police force. Their job is to track down the demons that have escaped into the world and send them back where they belong.
The whole concept feels like something I’ve read before, but at the same time, it never feels like a retread due to the great execution. Nick, as well as his partner Roy Powell, is a very likable and relatable character. We can see his struggles as he is forced to stay away from his wife and sympathize with him. The comic also does a great job at letting the reader know what’s going on without ever talking down to us or drowning us in exposition. The story is straightforward and, with the exception of one rather large loose end, wraps everything up pretty neatly. It’s a fun, enjoyable ride that even manages to surprise at times.
The only downside are the villains. Without giving anything away, neither Nick’s murderer nor the main threat towards the end of the story are ever given much character development, and their never really established as badasses that are worthy of our fear. Especially with the latter, the final fight scene is incredibly anticlimactic, and it seems like everything is wrapped up too neatly. It’s as if the series originally wanted to be five issues long, then had to condense everything to four and wiped out the development of the bad guys as a result. Instead of getting one incredibly powerful story, the decision to split time between two antagonists on unrelated missions keeps this book from being the masterpiece it could have been.
 |
| Taken from http://www.darkhorse.com |
The art is quite solid. It’s cartoon-y in all the best ways, offering a nice variety of colours that keeps each page interesting on its own merit. Also, the weapon and demon designs are incredible. I kept flipping the pages waiting to see what the next demon would look like and the facial expressions it would make. As someone who tends to focus much more on the story than the art, that’s about as high a compliment as I can give for design. The human characters are a little more standard, but they serve their purpose just fine.
All in all, R.I.P.D. is a very good story that had the potential to be great had Lenkov just focused on one storyline instead of trying to do two at once. While it isn’t everything it could have been, it’s still a fun read from beginning to end, and it definitely achieved its goal of making me interested in what comes next for these characters (stay posted for that). As a result, I definitely recommend it for the $12.99 cover price. It’s worth your time, even if it could have been so much more.
Chase Wassenar is the Lead Editor and Founder of the Red Shirt Crew. He’s greatly looking forward to R.I.P.D. City of the Damned, which comes out in May. You can read his other articles at ToyTMA, follow him on Twitter at @RedShirtCrew, or email him at theredshirtcrew@gmail.com.
The Red Shirt Crew Blog and Podcast Network 