“Danger: Reading this book will make you smarter”

  This is the tag line above the title that you may have or may have not noticed. This book WILL in fact make you smarter as it not only delivers a good story but an additional section in the back called “Science Class”, where Matt Hawkins talks about some of the ideas in the book and gives us some links to follow for further insight. The frightening or amazing (depending on your perspective) aspect about this section is that you come to the realization that the ideas or projects mentioned here are real. In my experience there has been no other group of titles (including The Tithe, Wildfire) that spark interesting conversations with people whether they read comics or not. Some comics you can absorb them quickly, like a Caprisun pouch drink, making you feel like you wasted your money. That is not the case here, if you wanted you could spend hours looking up all these links and in the end formulating your own opinion.  It’s a solid book that more people need to be reading.

   Last issue we got re-introduced to some returning characters and also met some new players. From the first arc to this one I think that there has been one major change, David has a girlfriend. Also we see that they are working on an Iron Man type suite for the government which is being funded by a company called Northlock. We also see a set of various cyber-attacks across the country one targeting electricity, traffic and the last a water plant. If that weren’t enough someone has remotely stolen a submarine. By then end of this issue we learn that David is in fact behind all of these. The second issue picks up right where they left off, except now a critical life support machine is targeted. This machine is hooked up to a Supreme Court Justice who is recovering from a kidney transplant. Lucky for the recovering Chief, these as well as the other cyber-attacks were all part of a secret project that the President and Undersecretary of Defense had been working on with David to test the vulnerability of the country. As it turns out the United States are a lot more vulnerable than they could have ever imagined. To make it worse, this is not a clear enemy that would even need to enter the country to cause all this chaos, so the President makes the drastic decision to order the death of several scientists across the globe. Meanwhile, the lowest bidder in the TALOS suite is looking for a new source of revenue and looks like he is looking to steal some of David’s work to do just that. Also we see the web that David for lack of better social skills is getting entangled in, let’s just call them “girl problems”. He is in long distance relationship with Mirra, he is being coveted by Sandra, treated by Dr. Jurik and has a harassment complaint with Lisa. I have to say, I feel bad for the guy but at the same time just chuckle as he got himself in that mess. You may be one of the smartest guys on the planet, but that does not mean you know women. I think he may find out soon just how lost he really is on the subject and who knows what kind of repercussions that may have.

   Overall, this is a solid second issue. We now know that they are going to take a proactive approach to the threats they’ve exposed, but their plan to eliminate other scientist cannot end well. It will be interesting to see how David’s relationship issues, a desperate CEO and a paranoid government all come together.  I got this feeling that we may see David in a TALOS suite sometime this arc, sure like Iron Man but a lot more realistic and with some twist Matt comes up with. The cover of the next issue gives us an idea that our beloved characters are going to be tricked into getting rid of the scientist that the government deems dangerous. Don’t miss out!

   Top Cow will be releasing a three issue story arc in August called “Eden’s Fall”, which includes characters from this book as well as Postal and The Tithe. If you have kept up with those books you have an idea of how they are starting to connect, and if you haven’t this this a perfect time to catch up. I look forward to seeing how this book in particular ties in with the other two, although we have already seen David work with Samantha on The Tithe. In case this is your first experience with Think Tank I recommend you go back and pick up the first volume, just be warned that the art is only in black and white (a common complaint that they addressed in these last two issues). Looking back at these issues and books will really give you a feel of the world these characters exist and how they are going to come together for what no doubt is going to be a great story in August.