Absolute Martian Manhunter #1 [Review]
Written by Deniz Camp | Art by Javier Rodriguez
Special Agent John Jones has had better days. After surviving a deadly explosion during a routine investigation, Jones awakens to a world that no longer obeys the laws of reality as he knew them. People exhale vivid clouds of colored smoke - expressions of hidden thoughts and unresolved pain. When he breathes it in, he’s overwhelmed by intimate, kaleidoscopic visions of their lives. As Jones attempts to return to normal, balancing a strained relationship with his wife and son, a suspicious task force, and a case that seems more tangled than ever, Absolute Martian Manhunter #1 slowly unspools his grip on reality.
Writer Deniz Camp crafts a smart, high-concept detective story about memory, trauma, and identity. The book opens in a familiar noir-ish register: terse hospital rooms, suspicious officials, and brooding inner monologues. But it quickly veers into something far stranger. What begins as a psychological fallout from trauma becomes something closer to a metaphysical awakening - or perhaps a descent into madness?Camp’s greatest strength here is restraint. He lets the surrealism bubble up organically, anchoring us in procedural language and emotional tension while quietly loosening our grip on certainty.
And then there’s the art. Javier Rodriguez’s pages don’t just depict reality, they revel in bending it. His style here calls to mind the fluid, otherworldly energy of Tradd Moore (The New World, Doctor Strange: Fall Sunrise), with its seamless panel transitions, neon dreamscapes, and elastic anatomy. Rodriguez takes that same kinetic elasticity and makes it uniquely Martian. The "smoke" Jones sees becomes the visual heartbeat of the issue: a swirling, prismatic force that breaks the formal boundaries of the page, cascading between memory and emotion. There’s a sense that the comic itself is struggling to contain the alienness of Jones’ new perspective.
Color becomes narrative. When John is "sober," the palette is muted and grounded. But as he inhales secrets, the colors burst forth: unnatural, uncontainable, utterly alive. It’s an ingenious visual metaphor not only for Martian telepathy but also for the act of empathy itself. As John’s perceptions expand, so too does the world of the comic, until even the layout structure seems infected by the chaos.
There’s an elegant friction between Camp’s measured, cerebral scripting and Rodriguez’s effusive, visceral visuals. Together, they create a book that feels genuinely alien; not in the sense of spaceships or green skin, but in how it reframes the human experience through a mind that was never entirely human to begin with.
I have to add, there’s an awesome visual trick they employ on the final page that helps bring the reader’s journey alongside John full circle. It’s an ingenious trick that had me grinning from ear to ear, and I think you’ll appreciate it too.
Overall, Absolute Martian Manhunter #1 is a bold, haunting debut that uses a superhero lens to explore how we navigate the aftermath of violence, and what happens when we see too much of others, and not enough of ourselves. For a character long defined by being an outsider, this story feels like coming home. Or at least, to a place close enough to recognize… but just strange enough to question.
