DMZ 60

DMZ is a Vertigo title set in a near future America in which the USA is caught up in a civil war between redneck libertarian gun nuts and the brutal military-industrial complex who control the central government. The series is set in New York, which is some kind of frontline or demilitarised zone between the two sides. I suppose the idea is to show First World readers what modern war is like, by bringing an Iraq-style maelstrom home to that most quintessentially American city.

I have never really been bitten by DMZ. The conceit is an interesting one, but it does rather strain credibility – while one could imagine a right wing anti-state insurgency emerging in the US, it is hard to see it becoming entrenched anywhere near New York. And whenever I have picked up an issue, the storylines about a journalist reporting on New Yorkers desperately trying to eke out a living in an abandoned city have never seemed that engaging.

This issue is a bit more interesting. It is part one of a two-part story, set before the civil war started, in an America falling apart thanks to the pressures of too many overseas wars being fought at once. The story is simple enough, following a cynical gun smuggler as he moves from selling guns to the highest bidder to outright commitment with the libertarian nutjobs. What is more striking, though, is the incidental details supplied in news reports, depicting an America of high school shootings, collapsing state services, domestic terrorism, massive overseas military deployment – basically our present day ramped up to 11. It is an evocative picture of a country on the brink of collapse. Martinburgh’s illustrations of the news reports deftly portray the sad state to which things have descended, with unclaimed coffins of fallen soldiers sitting out in a flooded air force base being a particularly striking image of state failure.

This episode ends with the gun smuggler heading off with the Free States Army (as the libertarian gun nuts like to call themselves) as they get ready for their uprising. There is a wonderfully tense sense of things being about to kick off, Armageddon being just around the corner. I may not stick with DMZ when it returns to New York, but this pre-apocalypse flashback is compellingly grim.