- ArchEnemies by Drew Melbourne, Yvel Guicet, Joe Rubinstein and Rick Hiltbrunner
- Available from Dark Horse Comics
- Originally published April-July 2006; Collected in January 2007 as a Trade Paperback
- 128 Pages
- ISBN 978-1-59307-699-3
One Hero, One Villain, One Apartment
The best way to sum up ArchEnemies is to say that it’s the Odd Couple, but with superpowers. A superhero and a supervillain (Ethan Baxter/Starfighter and Vincent Darko/The Underlord, respectively), who are bitter enemies in the costumed world of good versus evil, are actually roommates without the masks and simply don’t realize it. Drew Melbourne, writer of the series, gives the audience two main characters who are so distinct that within the first five pages, you understand what they’re all about.
Vincent is obsessively neat; Ethan is a slob. Vincent is eloquent and obviously very well educated; Ethan is the everyman. They play off each other beautifully, each the yin to the other’s yang.
As the series opens, we find Ethan in his guise as Starfighter fighting off one of Vincent's remote controlled highly destructive robots. Immediately, we’re clued into the fact that these two archenemies are actually roommates and just don’t know it. Their relationship is one of very strained, forced coexistence. So strained, in fact, that Vincent eventually decides he hates Ethan so much, he’s on the villain’s hit list.
Ethan assumes that the laser cannons and explosives mean that the Underlord has discovered his secret identity. Meanwhile, Ethan and Vincent, in their plain clothes identities, forge the beginnings of a cautious friendship. As events unfold, Starfighter and Underlord become even more bitter enemies, while Ethan and Vincent become uneasy friends.
The Verdict
The series plays with the usually cliché dynamics of hero and villain in a way that’s never been done better. As the audience roots for Ethan and Vincent to become comrades, keeping their fingers crossed for things to work out in the end, there’s a sense of the bittersweet. The closer the roomies become, the more it’s going to tear them apart when they finally discover each other’s secrets.
Drew Melbourne breathes life into two such interesting characters and the world they live in that you hardly want the series to end. The dialogue--an aspect where many comic books fall flat--is effervescent and refreshingly clever. The artwork by Yvel Guichet is the perfect blend of classic comic book and edgy, modern cartoon.
The combined effort is nothing less than magical.
ArchEnemies is a smart, thought provoking and wickedly funny look at the superhero and his foil. A rare gem indeed.
