Review by Ian Keogh

Alan Moore and Gene Ha’s Top 10 featured a busy police precinct in Neopolis dealing with a vast super-powered population and visitors from other dimensions. The Captain was Steve Traynor, once a legendary hero himself as Jetlad, and 1949 when he returned from war at sixteen was when the modern Neopolis was being built. Also arriving is Leni Muller, once the Sky Witch, a German who fought against Nazis.

The Forty-Niners is a story that eludes precise classification. Although super powers feature, it’s not a superhero story, and neither is it noir crime despite colourist Art Lyon’s choice to represent the past with extremely muted colour. The beginnings of a super powered police force certainly feature, and it’s also certainly a coming of age story, and a love story that factors in the social restrictions of the time. It’s also very true to Top 10’s initial concept of procedural police investigation, but there’s never an explanation of why it was only in 1949 that World War II ended, which is a pleasing touch.

It’s almost midway through before Moore feeds in the existential threat propelling the remainder, by which time readers have been seduced by Ha’s richly delicate art, strong on character and scenery.

Readers of the parent series will know where one plotline is heading, yet not the remainder. In keeping with the early days of Neopolis, The Forty-Niners isn’t as complicated, yet if there’s an underlying theme it’s that the good old days perhaps weren’t so great after all, especially if you were anything other than white and male. There’s prejudice against robots and vampires, yet very noticeably not a Black face in sight.

More straightforward than many of Moore’s other projects, this is nonetheless packed with interesting ideas in passing. What might Nazi scientists given American citizenships post-war and unlimited research budgets really try to construct? How much bigotry is just lack of understanding? It’s almost incidental that readers steeped in comics history will figure out who Moore’s based his leading characters on, but it adds a richness. There is no world-shattering revelation to the Forty-Niners, just a compassionate human drama well played out.

This is collected along with all other Top 10 related material in the Top 10 Compendium.