A Close Look at DMZ Part 2: Dropping in on the DMZ

Maybe the most important thing to accomplish in the beginning of any story is establishing the world in which it takes place. For something set in a world that's basically contemporary Earth with nothing supernatural or superpowered going on, that's fairly easy. The further you get from the everyday, though, the more complicated this can be. Then the question becomes how to do it. Some stories take a lot of time in the beginning to establish characters' surroundings and larger world, laying the ground work for when the reader finally encounters these things down the road. The other option is to drop the reader into a world and have them rely on context clues and snippets of information provided by characters and events to discover what's going on. It's this second option, arguably the riskier, that Brian Wood chose when he wrote DMZ.

The following will contain spoilers for DMZ 1-3.

In the Introduction I covered the concept of the world in broad strokes. And broad strokes are just what Wood uses to start the series. A very simple map on the first page establishes that there's a conflict of some kind, that forces for the participants in that conflict (the United States and Free States) are in positions of opposite sides of Manhattan, and that the island of Manhattan is a vaguely ungoverned "DMZ." Since the series' title is DMZ, it's reasonable to assume that's where the series takes place. But that's it. There's nothing else.

This lack of information isn't so bad, though, because we get introduced to our point of view character immediately. Counterintuitively, that character is not a resident of the DMZ--someone who could more or less take the reader by the hand and lead them through this new world.

DMZ 1

We immediately meet Matty Roth, a young man who's expecting to be a photography intern for Liberty News. Instead he gets roped into working with well known journalist Viktor Ferguson who's about to leave to do a feature in the DMZ while there's a ceasefire in place.

Matty's introduction is as vague as the DMZ's. In most ways he's a blank state. We can infer a little bit from his dialogue: that he is/wants to be a photographer and that the DMZ is not a safe place to go in his eyes. The lack of information about Matty in some ways lets him be a stand-in for us. We know roughly as much about the DMZ as he does so right from the start we're standing alongside him, learning as he learns.

"On the Ground" is the series' first story arc, covering issues 1-3. Within the first half of the first issue, the helicopter ferrying Matty and Viktor lands in the DMZ and falls under attack from unseen assailants. Viktor hops back in the helicopter, and it lifts off without Matty. This turns out to be fortuitous for Matty because the helicopter remains under attack and blows up moments later. It's right after this that Matty passes out and is rescued by the first DMZ citizen in the series: Zee.

DMZ 1

Matty wakes up on Zee's floor, an IV in his arm. Zee is a sort of independent medic. She was a med student before the war started but stayed in the DMZ and eventually opened up her own clinic. She performs rounds in her part of the city which gives her a kind of cred among the DMZ locals.

Using a cell phone Matty had on him when he was left behind, he gets a hold of Liberty News, explains the situation, and is assured that he will be extracted after the crash sight is secured. Matty gives Zee the first aid supplies he has in exchange for her guiding him back to the crash sight. Unfortunately "secured" means destroying the crashed helicopter and all its equipment. Matty and Zee are almost killed when attack helicopters open fire around the crash sight to deter locals. This is followed up by a bombing run.

This kind of bombing and artillery sequence will become almost a trope in the series. Over and over issues will depict assaults on the city--sometimes by bomber but more often using artillery and offshore bombardment. No matter how many times this happens the city doesn't seem to suffer additional damage.

DMZ 2

The next day, after he's ditched the Liberty News issued cell phone, Matty accompanies Zee on her rounds and discovers that the truth of the DMZ is quite different than what gets reported outside the city. Zee doesn't take kindly to the idea that Matty was part of a news crew coming to the DMZ. Needless to say that she (and by extension the other DMZ residents) is not interested in being put on  display by some outside news network. However, one of Zee's friends salvaged the news equipment before the helicopter wreck was destroyed. Rather than seeing the equipment simply sold off, Zee insists that Matty's in a position to report on what's actually going on in the city, and after some pressuring he decides to give it a try. With Zee as an escort, Matty is able to get safely in and out of parts of the city that no one from the outside--tourists they're called--could access.

Liberty News reaches out to Matty again, urging him to leave the DMZ so they can send a real reporter into the city. When Matty emphatically refuses and Liberty realizes they're stuck with him, they send him to the location of an incoming invasion force. The US is using Viktor's death as an excuse to send the military into the DMZ--something Liberty News knows because they have sources in the Pentagon (among many others places).

DMZ 3

The invasion kicks off with a bombing strike from nearby submarines. Matty is swept up by a military unit moving through the city. Along the way Matty is told when he can take pictures, what the pictures can show, and what the captions should read. The instructions Matty receives are pretty much a propaganda roadmap. This particular unit proves to be a mix of incompetent and unstable, and Matty is in danger of being killed by them more than once. At one point they come into contact with Zee who is trying to help civilians injured by the bombings and ground forces. Matty's presence with the unit drives a wedge between him and Zee. Eventually Matty is separated from the unit as more troops arrive and the situation heats up.

Liberty News reports on a successful invasion and the establishment of a beachhead in lower Manhattan. Liberty accepts Matty's photographs and reporting on the invasion, and he chooses to stay in the city after all.

DMZ 3

This first story arc introduces a lot of ideas that will be running themes over ther course of the series. The biggest is probably the depiction of the United States military (and eventually, by extension, the government). This is a military that from the foot soldiers to the brass, is completely uninterested in avoiding civilian casualties. And when troops do come across injured civilians they aren't predisposed to help them. There's no real attempt to identify actual threats as everyone seems to be considered an insurgent by default with no real explanation for why. One of the soldiers appears disconnected from reality as he stands and shouts in the middle of an intersection under enemy sniper fire, and the unit commander seem unstable when he threatens to cut Matty's throat if he doesn't go out into the intersection to retrieve the soldiers. The unit apparently has no media and no first aid equipment. The level of competence of the troops seen in this issue is staggeringly low, and while the series doesn't say, "the United States in a bad guy," it certainly isn't painting that side of the way as heroes. Easily the best metaphor for this is the series of panels showing missiles shot in Manhattan flying over a Statue of Liberty with a broken torch.

Also not portrayed in a flattering light is the media. Liberty News is the only outlet seen in this issue, and it is the primary one throughout the series. Liberty is a US entity, and its credibility is almost always suspect. Even here in subtle ways it's unclear where Liberty ends and military propaganda begins. Based on the reporting Matty says he's seen on the US side, the reality of the DMZ isn't portrayed with any accuracy at all.

DMZ 2

Less overt is the depiction of DMZ culture. Some places like Times Square are basically death zones. Some neighborhoods, such as where Matty first arrived, are insular, their residents hostile to outsiders. But there's also street vendors and rooftop cafes. There's no government so all these neighborhoods organize themselves.

It's the people who are most remarkable, though. At first blush, especially given the action in these opening issues, that seems a crazy thing to say. However, this story arc spends most of its time developing two strong characters, and neither one of them is Matty who is still painted in broad strokes by the end of it. Instead, it's Zee and The Sniper who we learn the most about. Zee works as a medic despite there being no hospital or apparatus supporting her. And The Sniper, a marine gone AWOL, used his weapon to clear out dangerous buildings until he ran out of ammunition. Now he's a one man neighborhood watch, warning the locals in case of danger.

And did I mention he's six months into a cross-scope relationship with a Free States sniper in New Jersey who he's never met?

DMZ 2

This isn't to say that Matty isn't developed at all, but the focus on Zee and The Sniper, two fully realized people within their environment, shines a light on how most of Matty's development is going to come in the form of growth going forward as opposed to who and what he was before entering the DMZ.

Characters are the real backbone of the series, and we already see that here. The least successful issue (which is not to say bad) is the third which is action packed and more interested in plot than people. We do get a nice moment with Matty at the end of the third issue where he faces a measure of fear and decides to stay in the DMZ anyway which is a nice payoff to everything that preceded it in the issue. But all of that time spent with the military unit isn't nearly as captivating as the rest of what we've seen in this arc.

"On the Ground" covers a great deal of ground (no pun intended) in three issues. When it comes to larger themes, it is arguably superficial compared to what comes in later issues, but it lays out many of the thought provoking ideas right at the outset. These are tantalizing hints about where this series will go in a larger sense.

From a story point of view these first three issues waste no time. The premise of the story is laid out with enough world building to act as a frame for additional details that will come later. Matty spends a lot of time playing catch up which lets us have the same fish out of water experience that he does. And we're treated to an excellent example of how story is arrived at through character in the form of Zee's influence on Matty and the way that shapes and prejudices the events he encounters.

Next time: Matty tries his hand at this journalism thing.

Apparently Useless Bomb Strikes Counter

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