REVIEW: Clue #1

Writer: Paul Allor
Artist: Nelson Daniel
Letterer: Neil Uyetake
Review: Art Bee

Clue #1 hit the shelves of my LCS under my radar. The classic board game CLUE® from Parker Bros. has been a family favorite all of my life. With the delivery of a comic book based on the game, I figured I would do a bit of research and learn its origins. CLUE® was created by Anthony E. Pratt, a native of England, in 1944 when he patented the game and sought its manufacture. In 1949 the Parker Bros. company petitioned for its distribution in the United States. This game is currently in production and played in over 40 countries. Now if you are like me, Col. Mustard is always the murderer and you believe so even if the proof says otherwise.

In the board game there are six suspects in the murder of Mr. Boddy, and I am sure we all know most if not all of them (Mustard done it!). The comic book brings these same six characters and a few others into the investigation of A. Boddy (clever, right?). At the very beginning of the comic book, the butler and narrator, Upton, tells you to read the story first, and there are three extra clues at the end. At this point my temptation was to flip to the back of the book to see the three clues, but in lieu of spoilers I fought the urge…
Hardest battle I have fought since quitting smoking.        

The first issue of this comic is just as you would imagine it. All of the players are introduced and A. Boddy is murdered. The mystery is afoot! Allor does a remarkable job staging the scene for the story, and his use of humor at various points acts as shots of nitrous in a street racer. Aside from a couple of awkward bits of dialog, the writing of the story is suburb.

Daniel does a great job depicting the scenes throughout the comic, and, since this is a murder mystery people should be scrutinizing over the details. This had to be a lot of pressure on the artist. What I really liked was seeing the use of old school shading dots. Way to go retro!

This comic is a relief to read. There has not been any decent murder/mystery comic books for a…ever. There has been some mystery and some murder. Clue #1 was just too great a find not to review. As an added bonus, Allor is a local boy in my area, so this issue has a nifty ink blot in the shape of an autograph on the cover. Score!!