You know, what's with Joss Whedon and season openers, anyway? Buffyverse newcomer Brian K. Vaughan steps in, and right off the bat I'm "feeling it" a lot more than I did with the entire maiden arc from Whedon himself. "No Future for You" as an arc has what "The Long Way Home" was really missing: a story focused on characters, not cheesy comic battles and silly villains. While, admittedly, the villains presented in this arc aren't a ton better, they're at least some slightly intriguing fresh faces. Best of all, what we get here is real character development out of Faith and even some additional insight out of Buffy. Not bad for a comic arc. So with all that said, I'm going to tackle each issue one at a time.
Although "Pt. 1" is, naturally, setup for the meat of the story, it sets things up with solid style. From Faith's opening mission that leads to slaughtering a bunch of vampire kids to her unlikely reunion with Giles and the mission ahead, there's a lot to like here. I really appreciated the nods to the series, such as the appearance of Robin Wood. It's good to know he still cares about Faith, even if they're not still together. I'd really like to know what happened there.
When Giles later explains to her that "There are nearly two thousand women with the powers of the Slayer, and not all of them have chosen to use their newfound abilities conscientiously," and Faith responds with, "You don't say," I can't help but grin. The same goes for the appearance of Giles' Eyghon tatoo, which I not only appreciate for continuity, but also for its relevance in the arc as a whole. When Giles mentions him and Faith not being so unalike, he's actually got a point. This speech of his hints at their more formal partnership they decide to establish in No Future for You Pt. 4 (8x09). Very nice.
Faith's mission -- killing another slayer -- feels utterly right to me, and immediately brings to mind Graduation Day Pt. 1 (3x21). That connection is clearly intentional, as in subsequent issues we actually get opening flashback frames to that episode. Each of those flashbacks has clear relevance to the particular issue they appear in, which I look forward to digging into when I get there.
Faith's Buffy issues aren't the only thing dug up either. Having to kill those vampire kids clearly affected her, as we see when she stabs Giles with a fork. Flashes of Consequences (3x15) are brought to the surface here. I applaud this issue for having the guts to immediately jump into many of Faith's unresolved issues stemming back to those crucial S3 episodes. The fact the issue ends with Faith all dressed up is just icing on the cake, because it ties into that rare girly moment she got to show to the Mayor when she was in the pink dress. Hey, look at that, this is flashed back to as well coming up. All in all: yes.
Besides Faith, we get a good look at the villains of the arc: Gigi and Roden. I must say that Jeanty's art for these two really brought them to life for me, which is unfortunately more than I can say for the inconsistent renderings of the main Buffy characters. When I first read this issue, I found myself missing the entire point of Gigi: to be a mirror of Faith in a different setting. This connection is obviously explored more thoroughly in the next few issues. Gigi is a somewhat interesting blend of rough gal and British royalty, and here in this issue that's enough to keep me interested. Although, I must admit that knowing what her simplistic motives are somewhat lessons the impact of her introduction here. The parallels to Faith, though, keep things a little more interesting.
There's also a wonderful little Buffy/Xander scene, which seems to be continue to hint at the possibility of something more for these two. The look on Buffy's face -- a mix of attracted and amused -- coupled with Xander's comment about checking her out, is certainly interesting. Regardless of that, how about Xander continuing to be hilarious? That sure never gets old. Buffy's reported dream is also worth thinking about. I'm guessing that the whole "The queen is dead" line is metaphorical in meaning, and likely has something to do with our villain Twilight and his/her plan to apparently abolish all magic. Regardless of what it ends up being, count me in as sufficiently intrigued.
For all I enjoyed here, I do have some minor complaints. First of all is simply the incredibly inconsistent art. Faith looks terrible in many of these frames, while in others she looks just fine. Sometimes, though, it's so off that it becomes quite distracting. That's not cool. I'm also not a fan of the continued abuse of the comic book format. Faith using that grappling hook in the beginning is beyond ridiculous. That goes for the incredibly massive flying gargoyles Roden conjures up. Do they really need to be that big? You'd think a lot more people would be noticing them. This whole "unlimited budget" idea still really concerns me, although fortunately it hasn't been spammed enough yet to have a serious impact on my reading.
So, to sum it up: I'm pretty happy with this one. Very, in fact, as I just recalled that this is the best-scored issue yet. Aside from a few problems that take the overall experience down a little bit, I'm calling this a successfull start.
