‘Ashes’ Comic Review

The independently published Ashes begins with two New York City firefighters Matt Terwillegar and his partner Lopez out on a call. After rescuing two little boys, Matt nearly gets injured when he and Lopez attempt to exit the building on a rusty fire escape. Matt manages to get off with only a twisted ankle, but when the two get off work he still decides to head home early instead of going out.

The next day starts out pretty well for Matt when he meets a girl named Sammy (who gives him her phone number) while on his morning run in the park. Later we meet Mr. & Mrs. Terwillegar, and discover that Matt has a somewhat rocky relationship with dad. The reason behind this is initially presented as resentment for being in his father’s shadow at work, from what I could tell, but several other causes behind Matt’s antagonistic relationship with his father are given later on in the story. Matt’s dad hints that the fire department may be offering Matt a promotion, but Matt is concerned that he’s only being considered because of his family’s legacy as firemen.

Ashes PDF-9

After dinner with his parents, Matt meets up with Lopez, and the two travel down to the fire house, where Matt is indeed offered a promotion to lieutenant. The offer weighs heavily on Matt, and still appears to effect him when the men are sent out on another call. Once again, Matt and Lopez are sent into the burning building to rescue anyone they can find, but this time Matt isn’t so lucky. He falls through some weakened floor boards, and is rushed to the hospital. When he wakes up later, he finds out one of his legs has been amputated. Understandably angry and frustrated, Matt takes this new handicap really hard.

The rest of the story follows Matt as he tries to put his life back together, only to continually be pushed back down into his post-accident depression by one thing or another. First he’s so certain that his health coverage won’t cover a quality prosthesis and therapy, then NYFD shuffles him off to a desk job. The whole time he’s convinced his father has some kind of weird agenda to keep him down, or that he doesn’t care.

All of this comes together escalating his depression to a point where, on more than one occasion, Matt cuts off contact with his son (who lives with Matt’s ex on Staten Island), simply because he cannot bear to let his son see him in his downtrodden state. I won’t give away the ending, but Matt’s journey back to being happy with his life is trying and definitely hard-fought.

Ashes PDF-37

The artwork in Ashes is mostly monochromatic black and white with some greyscale shading, which compliments the stark reality of Matt’s life and struggle to excellent effect. The characters are drawn in a rather angular fashion, giving them a hardened, masculine look, which, again, suits the story and its tone quite well.

One thing I found interesting about Matt’s plight was that it ended up being far less insurmountable than I had thought it would be from the get-go. With the exception of his mental anguish, all his problems ended up being solved in a relatively easy fashion, thanks to his devoted friends and generally solid support system. Also Sammy, who despite being forgotten about by Matt on more than one occasion, still keeps giving him chances to start a relationship. (I don’t know that I’d give a guy I’d just met that many second chances, accident or no.)

Overall though, Ashes was a skillfully-told story with realistic and believable characters. Matt’s struggle was no Sisyphean labor by any means, but still maintained a very believable level of strife that served to keep Matt’s attitude justified. Ashes is a heartwarming tale that I’d especially recommend to anyone who’s overcome (or is still overcoming) their own struggle(s) in life, because you don’t need to be an injured firefighter to relate closely to Matt Terwillegar.

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