Rio (1987) by Doug Wildey
This book, of course, is based on the then-recent hit by Duran Duran, which had swept the US charts and
What? What’s that you say?
OK, this is a pet peeve of mine — nowhere in this book is it even hinted at that this is a reprint. It originally ran in Eclipse Monthly, and I’m not sure whether it was modified for this edition or not?
Eclipse Monthly was a comic-book-sized publication, so the form factor is off, and you get these overly large left/right margins. But it still looks very good. I’m not sure the beige/pinkish borders work, though…
Anyway, it’s a pretty episodic album. There’s three stories — Rio tries to stop buffalo massacres in the first story (but runs afoul of a conspiracy).
I really like Wildey’s artwork — he does it in a style that extremely appropriate for a western: Gritty and old-fashioned. But also very lively. I mean, it’s not quite Jean Giraud, but it’s very appealing, and the storytelling has nice beats.
The only problem is that his faces sometimes look a bit off model.
The second story is about Rio encountering a gang of evil US soldiers, but it has a happy ending: They’re all killed by Geronimo.
And finally, the third story returns to the plot of the first one — Rio chases down one of the guys that framed him in the first story.
Heh heh. Yeah, I think you can tell pretty easily from this book that he’s got a real affinity for the material.
I’m not sure the book totally works as a “graphic novel”. It feels extremely episodic, even though it’s got a plot through-line, sort of. There’s no character development to speak of. But it looks great, and each individual story is very entertaining. Good on Comico for reprinting this.
Wildey would go on to do more Rio stories for various publishers, and it was all collected by IDW in 2012, and I’m now going to buy that volume, because I want to read the rest of Rio’s adventures.
Hm… oh darn, it’s out of print, and copies go for $100 and up… Oh, I found a copy in the UK for 47 pounds.
OK, let’s see if we can find any reviews…
Wildey’s done a lot of westerns.
Comic Book Marketplace #110, page #75:
In a
dramatic departure from his earlier pen and ink comics line
work, Wildey accented the strip with heavy use of zip-a-tone
complimented by moody watercolors. Fans, old and new,
went wild over Wildey all over again.
“What I was trying to do was get some kind of a western
that would have a little authenticity and historical conse-
quence to it, and not make it the usual comic book,” Wildey
explained. “With most of the events in Rio, the dates have
been changed or altered to enhance the story, but the
incidents that occur in Rio are based on historical fact.”
Wildey felt this historical approach is what set Rio apart
from what had gone on in the genre up until that point.
“I think it is effective,” he stated, no doubt harkening back
to his experience on The Outlaw Kid thirty years before,
“Effective enough that if anybody reads the thing, they will
at least not see the usual shooting of guns out of hands and
that type of thing, which has been done eighty zillion times
in comic books. This is a kind of departure in that sense.”
Looks like this has been reprinted in Italian, too. Which isn’t surprising — Italians love westerns.
The first volume of RIO opens with a double-page spread whose somber beauty and icy silence immediately immerse you in the atmosphere. In the foreground, the railway tracks and the carcasses of dead bison. On the right, the title “The Butchers” is written in orange letters against a background of bloodied hide. Beyond, the rider advances at the pace of his mount, whose nostrils flare with an icy breath. He crosses the snow-covered plain, amidst the peacefully grazing herd, dominated by the peaks of a coal-black mountain. An overlaid panel:The horse advances towards us at a slow pace, therider’s face turned to the right, his gaze fixed on theslaughtered animals. On the opposite side of the page, in the upper left corner,his name is emblazoned in blood: “RIO”.This double-page spread foreshadows the entire beginning of the first chapter:RIO’s arrival, his altercation with the railway director about the massacre—perpetrated from the trainby trophy-hungry “sportsmen”
Amazing Heroes #104, page #18:
HIS NAME IS RIO: Speaking of
Doug Wildey, some may remember
“Rio,” the western series he wrote
and drew in early issues of Eclipse
Monthly a couple of years back.
Comico is repackaging the 60-page
saga, adding some new pages and a
new Wildey cover, and will release
it as a 64-page full-color graphic
novel next summer.
R.A. Jones on Eclipse Monthly #10
The next offering comes
in the form of the latest installment
of “Rio,” a western by veteran art-
ist Doug Wildey. Westerns are one
of the subgenres of comics which
has fallen by the wayside in the
wash of super-hero titles. Kids like
Japanese robots nowadays, not
cowboys. The storyline here is
pretty standard western fare, with
the lone hero facing a horde of
badmen in an effort to clear his
name/with the law.
What places “Rio” a notch
above similar tales is the art.
Wildey is actually more an illus-
trator (like Al Williamson and the
late Reed Crandall) than he is com-
ic book penciller. His art is a balm
to the eyes. A full-page illustration
of Rio, rifle blazing as he faces four
horseman, is almost gorgeous
enough to frame. Though this com-
ic is being cancelled, I hope Mr.
Wildey finds another forum in
which to present his work.
Comics Interview #51, page #47:
GERRY: Right. (Laughter.) You know,
I think that as an industry it’s necessary
for us to explore different formats, to try
everything possible to make the medium
as accessible as it can be to any marketing
plan.
GERALDINE: In a sense, though, it
doesn’t matter. I mean, you could package
this thing in toilet paper. If the story and
the art aren’t good, then it doesn’t mean
a hill of beans! But it’s great to have a
nice-looking package because, if we want
to go into another market, we have to have
something that this outside market can
recognize and appreciate.
DARREL: Something I’ve been hearing
a lot about is the RIO graphic novel.
GERALDINE: Oooh, it’s great.
GERRY: It really is one of the nicer
packages. That might sound like our ego
tooting itself, but we’ve had so many peo-
ple, like Burne Hogarth, for example,
just rant and rave over it. Burne Hogarth
is one person who’s been trying to gather
some respect for the medium for years and
years, and to get a compliment from him
is just one of the biggest kudos that we
could have. And RIO is very much a
tribute to Doug Wildey. How we felt
about Doug and our interest in the RIO
project – we put all of that into produc-
ing this package. We wanted to see the
smile on his face, you know. A lot of real
hard production work went into it. It’s pro-
bably the most difficult book we’ve ever
produced. It had a lot of idiosyncrasies in
it.
DARREL: And you’re dealing here with
a story that has already been presented.
GERRY: That’s right.
DARREL: So what do you do when you
have something that has already been
presented?
GERRY: You produce it the way it should
have been produced in the first place. RIO
was always intended to be a graphic novel.
That was the way Doug designed it in the
beginning, and then the publishing deal he
ended up with was at Eclipse, who printed
it in 10- and 20- page increments. And
each part was produced differently –
when you put them together, none of them
looked the same – and you couldn’t en-
joy it as one visually consistent RIO story.
We took it and redeveloped all of the art-
work so that it was consistent throughout.
packaged it in a way that was concise and
all-inclusive, and just made the definitive
RIO package out of it.
This is a real labour of love for Wildey. There was no guarantee of any further Rio stories, so he threw everything into this three chapter gem, covering an inordinate amount of familiar Western scenes and characters. Gunfighters, cavalry, native Americans, a snowstorm, the railroad, buffalo, a bar brawl, a siege, a quest to clear Rio’s name and a trip to Mexico all feature. Many Westerns build to the inevitable town centre gunfight, but Wildey dispenses with that before ending his first chapter, knowing he has plenty of other scenes to draw. Not that Wildey is nothing more than the sum of his homages. There’s a viable plot with plenty of original twists. In among it all Rio is knowledgable and practical enough to know when standing on convention isn’t going to work.
The chances of a full Rio collection seeing the production process through is hardly likely, so the choice is this or the earlier printings and missing out on two good additional stories. The content is stunning, but the production questionable.
Well, I’m glad I have this edition too, then.