Peter Panzerfaust #1

Written by Kurtis J. Wiebe
Art by Tyler Jenkins

I hadn't originally planned to pick up this comic, but I'm a sucker for an impulse buy, and I thought I'd give it a try.  It should have worked better for me - this is a retelling of the Peter Pan story, set in the middle of Nazi-occupied Calais during the Second World War.  A group of orphans are the only survivors of a bombing run that hit their orphanage.  While despairing as to their future (very briefly), the mercurial Peter Panzerfaust appears in the hole the bomb ripped into the side of the building, and promises to lead them to safety.

The spend the rest of the issue dodging Germans before finding themselves in the abandoned store that Peter has been staying in.  We learn that Peter is an American teenager, who is searching for a woman named Belle.  Some Germans chase a British soldier into the store, and the issue ends very suddenly and strangely, with Peter howling like a wolf behind three Germans.

Clearly Wiebe is writing for the eventual trade, or this issue is missing some pages, because the ending does not make any sense whatsoever.  What also doesn't make much sense is that a bunch of orphans would be able to speak fluent English, but no one has any trouble understanding Peter, which rings false.

There's not a lot that makes sense in this issue, but the chase sequence is pretty cool.  I like Tyler Jenkins's art; his characters are lanky in a way that only teenage boys are able to be, and he has a good handle on the action and drama of the story.  I'd be surprised if I picked up the next issue though...