Now, before entering this main point, allowing me to note that a big problem with the discussion of license work is that you never really know what the license says. You can therefore question a decision, but this decision could have been determined by the people who hold the license, and it was therefore not a decision in the comic strip itself. Thus, things are difficult when you enter the licensed books and the determinations of how the said books are managed. In this spirit, there are generally three different approaches when adapting an old intellectual property in a series of comics. There is the approach “just do what they did, just in a comic form and with new stories”. There is “this does not work as is, so we will have to make changes to make it work for an approach to modern comics”, and finally, there are the “bones of the property, we will simply update it with a new series of comics”.

In this case, the bones of the manga / emblematic anime of Tatsuo Yoshida, Complete Googon (that we know in the United States as Speed runner) were very good. There is really not much that should be changed, and so it was very cool to see the new series of Mad Cave, Speed Racer, Simply do these minor changes to the status quo, and if not, simply follow the already cool world that existed for these fun characters.

Speed runner # 1 is the writer David Pose, the artist Davide Tinto, the colorist Rex Lokus and the Letter Buddy Beaudoin, and he does a very good job by keeping everything that worked in the original series (which is a lot) while adding new touches, and making the merger of various taken on the characters in a merged version of history.

What are the main changes in the classic History of Speed Racer?

One of the main decisions that Pipose must decide is how to manage Rex Racer, Speed’s older brother, who was the star runner of the family when speed was a child. In the original story, he and his father had a fall, and he disappeared, only to introduce himself as a racer X. In the animal remake of the 1990s of the original series, Rex would have been killed, and it was the version with which they went to the American version of the live action film of history, and of course, that’s what Pipose goes with it, as well …

I think it is a good change, even if it has always stretched the gullibility a little, because it is so much more dramatic that “Rex disappears and is worth to be the best racing car driver of all time, and a mysterious runner X who is the same age as Rex is now the best racing car driver in the world, but who always exceeds his chances of violating the race to speed, someone he does not have a direct connection.” So I love it. Another change which, I think, worked very well is the idea that speed is underway in underground running clubs, a bit like fasting and furious. It is an intelligent concept update, in particular with the use of Spirtle Racer as a media threshing man, and a social media guy, and an online game guy …

These are the types of changes that do not put a breach in the concept of origin, and add only layers to history, which allows it to make it more appropriate.

How does Davide Tinto reinvent the world of Speed Racer?

One of the most difficult things to do in this comic strip is how to adapt manga style characters without losing the exciting dynamic style of Tatsuo Yoshida and always keep the characters in a more traditionally “Western” art style, and Tinto and Lokus do an excellent job of this really delicate task …

In addition, of course, it is difficult to manage action scenes that are built around intrinsically in motion, because the movement cannot really be represented on a page, this is why you will notice that there are really not many sequences of car prosecution in the comic strip, while there are tons in television emissions, because this lack of movement is difficult to make the car really works on the page. However, this can obviously be done (David Aja has done a particularly surprising job of a car pursuit in a classic Hawkeye issue, for example), and Tinto and Lokus are doing well with their driving scenes, including the brilliant Farfuted breeds– Battles to which the different cars enter during these races …

Bringing an outdoor gang element is an inspired choice because it increases the danger and eliminates the risks of the racetrack and in the streets, so to speak. So you have the dangers of the main race stories, you have clandestine races, and you have the gangs involved outside of all this (there were gangs in the original series, but they tended to be more linked to the race stories. Here, you can diversify the plots a little). Pipose has given himself a lot of room to tell all kinds of stories with this configuration, and the already existing characters being so strong at the start, the book is in very strong fit when leaving the starting door.

Trixie does not have much sign time, but I think we will see her develop a little more in the series, in particular her history with her father, which is not really well in sight in the original series. However, he is such a cool character that I’m sure we’re going to get superb things in the future.

Pose has already made a name as a guy who can take what works on a property, keep this and update the rest, and so much work on Speed Racer, so there is less challenge for Peimpose, but hey, that does not mean that what he does is not very impressive, like that. It is a really fun book that will appeal to nostalgic fans, and people who do not know Racer X of Weapon X.

Source: Mad Cave Studios