Neil Gaiman's Mr. Hero: The Newmatic Man Volume One

I bought this one at my school's book fair back in 2018.

Title: Neil Gaiman's Mr. Hero: The Newmatic Man
Issue: Volume One
Date: 2016
Publisher: Super Genius
Writer: Neil Gaiman, James Vance
Penciler: Ted Slampyak, Bryan Talbot, Marc Sasso
Inker: Bob McLeod, Mike Witherby, Art Nichols, John Coulthart, Dave Hunt, Terry Beatty, Angus McKie, Bryan Talbot, Marc Sasso
Colorist: Kell-O-Graphics, Zachary Lynch, Angus McKie, Tony Kelly, Marc Sasso, Alan Craddock
Letterer: John Workman

Reprinting the first 9 issues of the 1995 series from Tekno Comix, which was a venture by Sci-Fi Channel (now SyFy; because things are cooler when spelled with y's, I guess) that brought in authors and media stars as creators and worldbuilders and then handed those projects over to the Tekno Comix writing and art teams for the production of the actual comics stories.

In this case, the "name" writer was Gaiman, who actually created five interconnected titles for Tekno Comix.

Mr. Hero tells the story of a Victorian-era steam-powered automaton, an intelligent robot used in magic shows in the 19th century, but whose real origin is a much more sinister one, linked to the demonic Teknophage, who has been manipulating events on Earth and other planets for centuries.

The Mr. Hero robot is discovered by aspiring magician and mime Jenny Hale in the basement of a museum of stage magic. The Teknophage at first wants the robot back, but later embarks on a more elaborate scheme of corrupting Jenny with wealth while using experimental brainwashing on her best friend.

Mr. Hero the robotic pugilist with a noble heart and 19th Century mannerisms does his best to protect Jenny, along with his alternate head, the Ratiocinator, who considers himself the brains of the operation.

There is a whole cast of oddball henchpersons and mysterious figures, and a fair amount of scheming, plotting, and infighting, while the friendship between Jenny and Mr. Hero shines through all of the mayhem.

The villains are the weakness of this story. They are SO incompetent. And a lot of that is intentional, part of the humor that makes the story entertaining. But it gets to be a bit eyeroll-inducing as they  just make dumb move after dumb move.

That being said, Jenny is a great character, and her chemistry with her robot friend is charming. Both versions of Mr. Hero are fun, and they are distinctive enough to add some variety to the dialogue.

The plot is more convoluted than it needed to be, but I really enjoyed this for the main characters.

Rating: 7.5/10