Written by Ron Marz
Art by Marco Castiello
Published by AfterShock Comics
I must say that Almost American has some tough sledding right off the rip.
It’s a story about married Russian spies who defect and try to make a new life undercover in America while watching over their shoulders for if and when agents of their former employers might find them.
This sounds so familiar to acclaimed FX drama The Americans that even the title can’t get away from it.
I was a big fan of that Matthew Rhys-Keri Russell two-hander, which ran for 75 episodes from 2013 to 2018.
Of course, there are some key differences.
The Americans took place in the Cold War 1980s, and Almost American picks up in 2008. Elizabeth and Phillip Jennings were active, committed Soviet spies undercover in America, but Alexy and Victorya are defecting to the United States. The Jenningses were paired up by the KGB in a false marriage, even though they live a life together and develop complex emotions for each other. Alexy and Victorya married for love, not mission, though both are legacy hires for the FSB.
The Americans creator Joseph Weisberg, a former CIA operative, based the show on the exposure of Russian operatives living as Americans in 2010. He set it in the early 1980s because, back in 2013, much of the American public didn’t consider relations with Russia to be so fraught anymore. (Oh, how things changed!)
Almost American is not created by an ex-CIA man who infused this family drama with his own knowledge, and access to knowledge, of Cold War-era spycraft.
Almost American is created by Janosh Neumann – well, that’s the name he’s going by. See, he and his wife were actual FSB agents who fled the country and defected to the USA.
The Americans was inspired by a true story about a spy ring. Almost American is based on a true story.
But enough preamble! Is this comic book any good?
I’d say, yes, with reservations.
My only reservations about the title is that this first issue is more like a first part in the story. We open on Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, with a married couple entering the U.S. Embassy there. At the front desk, Alexy and Victorya identify themselves as Russian operatives seeking to defect and promising information about corrupt government and FSB officials plus assets hidden in the West.
Ron Marz, a 30-year comics veteran, infuses Alexy and Victorya with character right out the gate. It’s important to get that way operatives can cut to the chase while remaining vague enough.
And Italian comics artist Marco Castiello produces in a hyper-real style. The panel work is solid, but it’s the way he draws Alexy’s tired, baggy eyes that gets me. Castiello conveys that these are glamorous people who were adorned in a luxurious life. Now they’re roughing it in a way they likely haven’t done in a long, long time, going by the broadly sketched biographical timeline for Neumann that runs in the back pages.
I’m just not sure how well this series can get out from under the shadow of The Americans. And this first issue, while solid, feels less like its own episode with a beginning, middle and end. Will this comic book play out more like one big story cut up in a bunch of parts? That’s my concern, and then it should have been a graphic novel instead.
But this is a fine start to an intriguing premise that gathers steam once you know this story’s the real deal.
