Adventures West Coast #4: The Lone Ranger Vol 1: Now And Forever
Look, I don’t do much preliminary research for these things. Sure, we live in a world where Wikipedia is just a mouseclick away, but I’m not on wiki when I’m reading these books. If something stands out to me, I might research it further, but I don’t check to see what has come before as I’m writing these. That said, I know next to nothing about the Lone Ranger. I know he’s a hero on a horse named Silver. I know he’s masked, and I also know he has a sidekick, named Tonto. That’s where it ends. So, that’s what I took with me into reading this book.
Dynamite Entertainment presents The Lone Ranger, a pretty solid story by Brett Matthews & Sergio Cariello. I feel the need, however, to explain an oddity of the “Dynamite process”. You see, they hire “name” artists to do character desgins, then pass the actual books on to somewhat lesser known artists. In the case of The Lone Ranger, the character designs are by John Cassaday, whom most know by his work on Astonishing X-Men and Planetary. Now, I’m sure that John brought something to the table, in terms of visualizing the characters, but I don’t really know why he gets a credit. I mean, he listed in the credits just like he was there for the whole process, but it’s almost like he wrote the screenplay, but not the final script. It’s clearly a marketing ploy, so that his name will attract interest on shelves. I understand this, but I’m still bothered by it for some reason. I feel that it takes away from the work and time that Cariello’s putting into the book, month in and month out.
So, The Lone Ranger wasn’t always alone. You see, he was a Texas Ranger, along with his father and brothers. One day, out on patrol, all but one of them are killed in an ambush. Left for dead, the Lone Ranger wakes up in the desert, only to find that he’s about to be killed by a masked assailant. At that moment, he’s saved by a well-timed arrow from a mysterious man on a horse. We find out that this man is a Native American, named Tonto, who proceeds to nurse The Ranger back to health.
Meanwhile, Black Bart, a mysterious black man travels the frontier, killing all rangers and relatives of rangers. He was the one who had ordered the original hit, and when he finds out that a ranger survived, he sets out to finish the job. After some back and forth, The Ranger and Tonto form an uneasy alliance, as Tonto agrees to help him get his revenge on those who murdered his family.
It turns out that one of The Ranger’s brothers was married, but had kept the wife and child a secret, so as to protect them. The Ranger knew about this secret family, and sets out to protect them before Black Bart reaches them. Tonto uses himself as bait to distract Bart, while The Ranger continues on. In the end, The Ranger manages to save his remaining family, returns to save Tonto, and leaves an incapacitated Bart with a knife. You see, over the course of the adventure, The Ranger remembers a lesson that his father had taught him: sometimes the job calls for killing, but once you start killing, it changes you. The Ranger knows that Bart’s evil, but he won’t allow him to change him. Bart’s trapped in a derailed train, with little hope of survival. The Ranger won’t finish him, but he leaves him with the means to finish himself, should he choose to do so. With everything wrapped up, The Ranger and Tonto make their partnership official, and Tonto first calls his friend “Kemosabe” as they race to the horizon.
In all, it was a solid read. It was a great origin story, which left the door open for many more stories to tell. There was a b-story involving the railroad as it moved west. It’s clear that it’s development would be important or the development of the nation, but it’s also a political goldmine. We meet a character, Butch Cavendish, who seems ready to take advantage of that expansion. It’s clear that he hired Bart to round up a gang to take out the rangers, but his full intentions aren’t known at this point. The story felt somewhat decompressed, as the whole thing took place over 6 issues, when it probably could’ve been done in 4. That said, I’m putting the book in my “to keep” pile. For now.
