The (anti)hero that 2021 deserves; Geiger delivers pure guilty-pleasure escapism; an atomic folk tale for the apocalyptic age that we’ve found ourselves in. It is particularly noteworthy for being the first creator-owned title from regular collaborators Geoff Johns and Gary Frank; a team who have produced some of the best-selling superhero comics of the decade (Shazam, Batman Earth One, Doomsday Clock). Free from the shackles of mainstream franchises and corporate oversight, Geiger is a love letter to pulp sci-fi and to action blockbusters in equal measure.
Set in a post-apocalytic 2050, the initial 6-issue miniseries is presented as a campfire tale; recounting the urban legend of Tariq Geiger, an outsider living in the atomic wasteland of Nevada, battling the forces of a mad local despot, and forever separated from the beloved family that he has sworn to protect. The Cold War influenced a broad range of sci-fi over the 60’s to the 80’s; from radioactive creature features at the cinema, to Silver-Age comic heroes like the X-Men and Hulk, to Wasteland epics like the Mad Max movie trilogy. Johns and Frank have drawn on all of these sources, and they have a lot of fun folding in timeless adventure tropes from the likes of Robin Hood and William Tell.
The artwork of Gary Frank is as stunning as ever; the craters and plains of the Nevada desert are rendered with beauty, whilst Geiger’s atomic trasformation is spectacularly designed and realised (inspite of, and possibly slightly because of looking like a mash-up of a few old Master Of The Universe characters). Geoff Johns’ writing is generally characterised by its grounding in relatable human struggles, and he brings the same to Geiger, with a nicely told redemption arc for his violent anti-hero. By the close of the story, it’s clear that Johns and Frank have much more ambitious plans for the world they have created. I wouldn’t be surprised if 5-10 years of comic stories spin out of the worldbuilding started here, so this presents a rare opportunity for new readers to get in on the ground-floor of a future epic. Regardless, Geiger is in-and-of-itself a very enjoyable self-contained tale, and is a pulp adventure worth escaping into.
