The Clock – a bioterror story from Top Cow Productions

The Clock

Matt Hawkins has returned with another thriller with The Clock, this time centered around weaponizing cancer!

Before Covid-19 was even on the horizon, before anyone knew it was even in the United States, Top Cow Productions shared the first issue of The Clock with us.  This was back in December of 2019. Being one of my favorite writers I devoured this first issue wanting more.

Now this is where things get eerie. Weeks before I read the first issue I had already come into contact with Covid and by this point was already sick. Approximately a week later I was hospitalized and spent over a month in the hospital. By then listening to the nurses speculate about what had kicked my ass and doing the same regarding Covid (which everyone still believed wasn’t here), one of them asked what would happen if someone weaponized the virus and targeted the United States. For days I thought about the implications of that and was reminded of that issue of The Clock.

The story follows Jack Davidson as he is trying to identify why some communities are hit by a viral cancer and others are not. By the end of the first issue his wife was killed by lung cancer, seemingly unrelated to his research. Naturally inquisitive Jack quickly asks too many questions and as a result becomes targeted by the villains of the story.

The story flows at a steady pace for the first three issues but seems to make a major leap in the story in issue four. Normally I love the four issue format of his books but felt the finale should have been fleshed out just a bit more before then, meaning one to two more issues in the story. As a whole it was a dark story that was well told, I just wanted a bit more.

POSTAL LAURA ENDS THE VOLUME WITH A BANG

Postal

THIS IS THE MOMENT THAT POSTAL FANS HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR, THE END OF THE VOLUME BUT NOT THE END TO THE CHARACTERS….HOPEFULLY.

The final installment of this volume of Postal is here and it is by far one of the most perfect endings to a story we’ve ever had the pleasure to read. The issue gives a perfect ending while leaving it completely open for a new story arc. Last issue resolved all remaining threads concerning Mark’s father by giving him a homemade lobotomy in the basement of a church. This issue focuses on Mark as he becomes the mayor he wanted to be instead of the mayor his mother wanted a year after his father was defeated.

Oddly Mark visits his mother’s grave. The act itself is not odd but the fact that she died and we didn’t see it happen in previous issues, does that mean she’s really dead? Is there a flashback showing what happened? To find out you will need to read the issue and I can tell you that this issue does answer those questions.

The artwork was by far some of Isaac’s best and I hope to see him back on the book when it finally returns. It won’t be the same without him. The same can be said for the rest of the creative team as well. This book continues to be one of the best series I’ve read and even though all good things must end I must say that I wish it wouldn’t.

UNTIL THE NEXT VOLUME BEGINS PLEASE ENJOY THIS PREVIEW COURTESY OF TOP COW PRODUCTIONS AND IMAGE COMICS: