Overview: A
six-issue comic book series published by Icon (Marvel Comics) and released
April 2012 and finished up this month. The series teams writer Mark Millar (Wanted,
Kick-Ass) with Watchman artist Dave Gibbons, to tell the story of Gary, a
young hoodlum headed towards a life crime until his uncle steps in and offers
Gary an opportunity at a better life. Matthew Vaughn, Andy Lanning, and Angus
McKie round out the creative team as co-plotter, inker, and colorist,
respectively.
Note:
Although every effort will be made to keep them at a minimum, any spoiler
alerts will be noted ahead of time.
Go, Go
Gadgets!
 |
| Whoa! Gadgets everywhere! |
The
Secret Service boasts many gadgets
throughout the series. The gadgets, such as jet packs, cyanide spikes,
poisonous gas gloves and suits, were reminiscent of 1960s Connery gadgets,
while the pen lasers, neural disruptor and the video-linked spy glasses (they
incorporated a webcam/microphone/earphone into black rimmed sunglasses), seemed
more at home within the Brosnan era of Bond. Both Jack and Gary often resort to
gadgets to help them out of particularly sticky situations. In fact, Jack
resorted to a gas suit, neural disruptor, and his voice controlled car to
escape from a Chinese military building. And Gary, in fighting just one
henchman, had to utilize a laundry list of gadgets: the gas glove, stun
grenade, dart-firing watch, cyanide spike, and laser pen-knife.
The use of
all these gadgets is not in keeping with Craig’s filmic and videogame Bond.
Craig mostly used his smart phone, and there is only one instance in which it
seems that Jack may have used his smart phone to hack a person’s diary
(calendar). With limited use of gadgets, Craig’s Bond depends more on his
ingenuity. Much of The Secret Service
follows Gary’s story, so even though he depended on gadgets, there were several
instances where he relied on his resourcefulness that he learned from growing
up with a rough crowd. For example, when Gary wakes up to find himself in some
South American country with no clothes and 24 hours to get back to English
soil, he is able to commandeer a patrol car, weapons and ammunition, storm a
drug lord’s home and hijacks his
plane so he can get back home.
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| Gazelle knows a thing or two about gadgets |
In the case
of The Secret Service, the gadgets
complimented rather than detract from developing the characters in the story.
The gadgets incorporated provided a welcoming variety of potentially realistic
contraptions to the most absurd, rather than falling into the limitation of one
gadget, the smart phone, which happens with recent Bond videogames (such as 007:
Blood Stone and Quantum
of Solace). And, as mentioned above, the
gadgets provide many nods to its original source material, James Bond and Q.
Damaged
Birds
The
portrayal of women in The Secret Service
fair rather badly, in comparison to their Bond Girl counterparts. There are
three women identified by name and are drawn with detailed features, but only
two that are fleshed out. As it happens, they are both not without their
issues.
 |
| Sharon and Jack fight over what money can buy |
Gary’s
mother, Sharon, is a single mother living with her unemployed boyfriend Darren
in an estate flat in a bad part of London. Darren is the father of Gary’s young
brother Ryan, however Gary’s father is never mentioned in the series.
Unfortunately, all three are regularly abused by Darren through his
overbearing, controlling personality. Sharon’s attire is bland; basic shirt and
skirt in solid colours. Her hair is always pulled back into a ponytail. Her
facial expressions are often haggard and run down. Her relationship with Darren
is unhealthy and she unable to discipline Gary in the opening pages of the
series. She is powerless and without any apparent control over her life. Added
to that, she is apt to blame society for her woes. She is not Bond girl
material, nor is she expected to be. She is dependent on the men in her life:
Jack to spring Gary out of jail, Darren to put a roof over her head, and Gary
to provide her a home. There is promise that perhaps she will gain a certain
amount of independence and sense of responsibility for herself and Ryan, but
the reader can only speculate.
Then there
is Ambrosia, the other most developed female character. She is the lover of Dr.
James Arnold and has been with him for some time. She knows about Arnold’s
plans for the world, but she is not compelled to take any action until late in
the story. Although her attire is not glamorous, she does live an affluent
lifestyle provided for her by Arnold: traveling around the world and shopping
for instance. Her hair is flowing and free, not pulled back and kept. She is
beautiful and attractive, not tired as Sharon is portrayed.
<<
SPOILER ALERT – SKIP PARAGRAPH TO AVOID STORY REVEAL >> As the villain’s
girlfriend, she is a source of information. Jack pursues and charms her; they
make love. Afterwards, Jack tells her he will not insult her intelligence, and
she responds that she know that he is looking for information against
Arnold. Guilt arises from her
reflection of what Jack must think of her (a loose woman), rather than the fact
that she has cheated on Arnold (again, after promising not to). Ambrosia
ultimately responds like a conquest of Bond’s, she turns against Arnold,
demanding at gunpoint that he abandon his plans. Without hesitation, Arnold
orders one of his henchman to kill her and he does. This is not new ground for
women in this kind of story. If applying the trope that bad girls must be
punished for being promiscuous then Ambrosia was punished with her life.
 |
| She knew what Jack wanted |
The third
named woman is Teri, the Deputy Training Officer at the spy school. She appears
briefly in Issues 3 and 4 as one of the authoritative figures that vocalizes
disbelief that Gary is spy material. Although a young, slender blond woman, she
does not stand out and is too underdeveloped as a character.
One aspect
of the spy school that wasn’t revealed until Issue 6 and that is the existence
of co-ed dorms where a couple of female spy students were present. After going
back through the other five issues, there in Issue 2 was the presence of a
couple of women in the school uniform, participating in maneuvers alongside
their male classmates. However, when one of the school tests involves going to
the local club to grade their flirting and love making abilities, it was all
the male students out for the night. One has to wonder if the female students
were in attendance as well, being graded on their ability to charm the opposite
sex? Does seem that if they sleep and work out at school, then the women should
have been amongst the crowded club scene. It would have been very difficult to tell
since the female spy students in the Issues 2 and 6 were devoid of
distinguishing facial characteristics: it was the clothes and the indication of
breasts is what gave away that there was a female presence at all!
Attack of
the 50’ Nerd and An Unemployed Bully << SPOILER ALERT – ENTIRE
SECTION >>
 |
| Should the villain have a sensitive side? |
The
megalomaniac behind the mysterious kidnapping of celebrities (a lot of them
sci-fi, which should have been a clue right there!) is a geeky nerd. His
empire, base on cellular phone technology, supported his darker vision: to
transmit a certain frequency on cell phones that would cause people to kill
each other. Thus, by drastically reducing the burgeoning world population, his
actions would turn back population numbers to the early 1800s. His
justification: he was saving the rest of the human race. Kidnapping
celebrities, such as Mark Hamill and a Bond actor, resembling Pierce Brosnan,
was because they were his idols and he wanted to save them from death. Saving
the human race was a bit fantastical, especially since he couldn’t watch the
death caused when testing of his frequency out. Playing god isn’t a new concept
for the Bond villains, but usually it’s for greedy reasons.
There were a few twists to the villain.
In one scene he is chastised by his henchman Gazelle for being insensitive by
giving nicknames to his subordinates based on a deficiency. For instance,
Gazelle was a double amputee fitted with special legs, all paid for by Arnold.
One of his other henchmen wore a patch over his missing eye, so Arnold
nicknamed him Cyclops. And, Arnold misplaced what was important. He worried
about what to wear when meeting Ridley Scott, but he should have been more
concerned about Ambrosia’s motives for cheating on him.
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| Darren and Sharon |
Like many of
the more recent Bond films, there was a second layer of villains. These were
the ones that personal to Jack and Gary. Darren’s cronies challenge Jack in
Issue 2 when he is meeting with Gary in the local pub. Gary witnesses as Jack
beats all of the cronies into submission. The fight is symbolic for gaining
Gary’s freedom from the neighborhood, which will later be revisited in Issue 4.
In this second showdown at the local pub, Gary must face Darren and his cronies
on his own. Darren has been Gary’s personal nemesis, particularly with regards
to how his mother has been mistreated and disrespected by Darren. The fight
represents a rite of passage for Gary because although he has just transformed
physically into the secret agent protégé, can he ultimately break away from
what Darren represents: the old way of life?
Observations
One of the
biggest departures from Bond is revealed as Jack explains to Gary the wall of
framed newspapers. Jack collects the following day’s newspaper as a memento
after each mission. While the headlines report on some celebrity event or some
other inconsequential event, Jack has risked his life saving the day while the
everyday person lives their lives in ignorance. While one would think that Jack
might be frustrated by the lack of acknowledgement of his duty to God and
Queen, Jack isn’t. He tells Gary that what he does is a service to help people
from the behind the veil of secrecy – that’s his job satisfaction. It’s his
driving philosophy for being a secret agent, a value that he instills in Gary.
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| Gary has a lot to learn about the art of love |
Another
observation was the limited interaction between either Jack or Gary with women.
Jack has an afternoon with Ambrosia for the purpose of securing information
against Arnold, but he isn’t portrayed as a bed-hopping spy. Nor does he seem
to have a regular girl friend. Gary is also without a girl friend. In fact, he
is inexperienced with wooing the ladies. For example, while Gary surpasses all
expectations with the various trials at school, it is the night out to test and
hone their flirting skills that baffle Gary. Perhaps Gary is still too young;
he reacts with disgust to having watched and listened to Jack and Ambrosia have
sex. Gary does focus his attention on his mother, providing her with a better
living environment, because he has the means to take care of her. However, at
the end of the series, Gary remains alone, having never hooked up at least with
one of his female classmates.
The
Secret Service pay homage to many aspects
of James Bond – the suave spy, the myriad of gadgets, the sporty car with
deadly extras, the villain and his henchmen, and women – but Mark Millar also
explored the boundaries of being a spy, such as motivation, and gave depth to
an otherwise guarded and secretive Bond inspired Jack London. The
representation of women is still problematic and familiar tropes of the genre
are employed. That said, Gary’s desire to help his mother in spite of her
shortcomings is admirable. It reveals Gary’s sense of maturity to forgive and
to help those in need without the expectation of anything in return. These
values are emphasized and reiterated multiple times leading one to believe that
the moral to this tale is one of compassion towards
others.
