TITLE: Road Rage #1
AUTHORS: Stephen King, Joe Hill. Adapted by Chris Ryall.
PENCILLER: Nelson Daniel
PUBLISHER: IDW Publishing
PRICE: $3.99
RELEASED: February 15, 2012

By Rob Siebert
Editor, Fanboy Wonder

Road Rage is a title that’s got a fairly long trail of bread crumbs behind it. It’s a comic book adaptation of a 2009 novella called Throttle by Stephen King and his son Joe Hill, which was inspired by a 1971 TV movie called Duel, which was based on a widely renowned short story of the same name by Richard Matheson. Whether it’s first issue lives up to its lengthy journey comes down to whether or not you have patience, and how much you like big vehicle crashes.

When we open the book, a motorcycle gang called The Tribe is on the hunt for the sister of a man who screwed their leader, Race Adamson, out of the money he made from starting a Meth lab. Race’s father Vince is apprehensive about this course of action, but Race is insistent. Later, on the open road, they run afoul of an 18-wheeler whose driver is shrouded in shadows. When the driver starts looking for blood, things get very, very ugly…

Having no experience with Throttle or Duel, I had to do a little research to fully understand what’s being done here. Duel is a story about a driver being chased by a tanker truck (the film adaptation was actually Stephen Spielberg’s directorial debut). With this story, Stephen King and his son paid homage to Duel by using the same premise in Throttle.

More than half this book consists of dialogue that sets up the conflict between Race and Vince. For yours truly, that was a little tough to get through. I’m not sure if that’s the issue’s fault or mine. Obviously it’s necessary, but somehow it seemed to drag it’s feet. Perhaps it only seems that way when you look at how the issue suddenly hits the gas (no pun intended) at just past the half way point, and things really get interesting. Either way, I don’t necessarily blame the story for it this time around.

Nelson Daniel’s art feels that midway kick as well. There’s no shortage of blood, as you’d likely expect when you’ve got motorcycles crashing like this. It’s easy to feel the impact when a rider meets his demise at high velocity against the pavement. Just think about the last time you drove out on the highway and glanced down at the pavement whizzing by in front of the vehicle…I shudder just thinking about it.

Road Rage gets a slow start, but eventually delivers the thrill quality you’d expect from a Stephen King story, and that’s just in one issue. We’ve still got one to go, plus a two-issue adaptation of Duel!

Front page image from comicbookcritic.net. Interior image from scribd.com.