The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Written by Chuck Dixon
Art by Esteve Polls

I'm not a big Chuck Dixon fan, but I do like reading the occasional Western comic, and this book was only $5, so I thought it was worth the risk.  Before discussing it at all, I feel like I should include the following disclaimer:  I have never seen he original The Good, The Bad and The Ugly movie, and therefore entered into this book with no knowledge other than the fact that the guy who kind of looks like Clint Eastwood is probably the hero.

It's a good thing that I was able to figure out that much at least, because there is next to no exposition in this comic.  The story that takes up most of the book involves the Man With No Name chasing a train full of gold that is rolling across Mexico, guarded, for some reason I never figured out, but a group of French soldiers.  I'll admit I'm not all that well-versed in Mexican/American history (aside from what I got out of Vollmann), but I had no idea that French forces once worked within Mexican borders.

Anyway, this story was kind of confusing, as the Man kept making and breaking partnerships, and no one seemed to have a clear story.  The other stories that fill out the book are clearer in the way they were plotted, but at no point did this book do anything original.  In fact, had the Man suddenly become Jonah Hex, I probably wouldn't have noticed.  It's like reading the poorer issues from that title.

My biggest problem with this book lay in the artwork.  Polls is quite good at drawing static scenes, but his action sequences were very hard to decipher at times.  Also, I noticed that depth was an issue here - at a couple of times, two characters have a conversation about a third that he apparently can't hear, but in the artwork, it looks like they are all standing together.  There was a lot of shoddiness like that.