A Comic by Dan Fogler, Laurence Blum, Ben Templesmith

It’s been a while, and I really need to review what I thought was the final issue of Fishkill from Heavy Metal Magazine, but it turns out there is more after this (it ends saying “end of part one”). So far, this has been an interesting comic that actively plays around with conspiracy theories and the paranoia that surrounds many that may be fearful of some giant Government takeover at some point in the future. It does flirt with the sort of overdone right-winged garbage that many in 2022 are now tired of due to groups such as Qanon, but thankfully it never goes full-bore into that territory. We have your obligatory “mandatory vaccines!”, “taking all the guns!”, “Marital Law!” dog-whistles here, which may have been shocking and interesting when this was first written, but with how politics have turned in 2020-now, I’m honestly sick of hearing about it. I can make an assumption as to where the author stands politically, especially considering when this was released compared to the Covid-19 global Pandemic, and assume there is an ulterior motive here.

“Dan Fogler, fan favorite actor in The Walking Dead and J.K. Rowling’s Fantastic Beasts, lends his writing talent to an original new comic book title, Fishkill, published by Heavy Metal. Fish Kill is a love story wrapped in a modern noir that takes our hero, Detective Bart Fishkill, so far down the conspiracy rabbit hole that he starts to question his own sanity even to the point of wondering whether if he isn’t the villain in the first place.”

The majority of this comic is Fishkill and a young strung-out girl named Andramada trying to avoid police detection as they are basically the number one and two most wanted people in the entire United States at the moment. Fishkill is in serious-mode overdrive, and “Andi” is basically thirsting after him seeing that he’s a big strong man that saved her. One can assume this is the beginning of a very unlikely romance story, but what we get does not finish out this storyline. It will be very interesting to see where everything goes, as we now have a trio of would-be heroes fighting against an international conspiracy that seems to have the aims to unravel what it means to be an American.

I honestly am starting to be annoyed by this series, as what started as a playful exercise in conspiracy theories coming true is turning into a right-wing alarmist wet-dream. This is becoming no different than a lot of self-published Amazon books that are entirely about evil democrats outlawing guns, and some “super-Patriot” having to save the day. Considering the political climate at the moment, and my assumption that any sort of subtlety will slowly erode from this as it goes, I may just read one more issue before hanging this up. What started out with a lot of promise, has decided to go down a path I’d rather not travel.