Nathaniel Dusk (1984) 1

Nathaniel Dusk (1984) 1

Feb 1984

Lovers Die at Dusk

by Don McGregor, Gene Colman, John Costanza, Tom Ziuko, Alan Gold

New York City - Jan 31, 1934. Nathaniel Dusk, Private Investigator, goes about his business. He is followed by a couple gun toting men. Dusk eventually realizes that someone is following him while he is sitting in a restaurant with Joyce Gulino, his girlfriend. He approaches the man who denies that he’s following him.

Dusk and the other man get into a fight. Blows are exchanged in the restaurant. The other man gets away and Dusk is left behind to explain what happened to the police. Nathaniel and Joyce get into an argument. They kiss and makeup after they return to her place and have dinner with Jennie and Anthony, her kids.

Dusk returns to his office later that night. The two men who were tailing him earlier in the day are there waiting for him. They take him to the Empire State Building. They take him up about 20 floors on to a ledge. He tries fighting back but one of them punches Dusk and he goes over the side.

Thoughts

If he’s dead then presumably the rest of this mini-series will go back and fill in what led to all this. I’m not sure how he can survive a fall from that height. One of the goons says something about his girlfriend being the cause of his death. That makes me wonder if her ex-husband is angry because she left him. Just to be clear there is no mention of the father of her kids but it seems like she is not married.

This story is not inked but it is colored. I’m not completely won over by that aspect of the book.

This series is printed in the Baxter format, as were a few ongoing series that began about the same time: New Teen Titans (1984) and Legion of Super-Heroes (1984). It is easy to overlook that fact in retrospect but back then it really made this series stand out.

The flow of the panels on some pages is a little weird. I had to take my time and read a few pages more than once in order to get the progression of events in the right order.

There is a little bit of background provided about Dusk. He was once a policeman but he saw too much corruption in the police department and quit. That was in 1931.

There is also a 2-page text piece titled…

On Freelancing and Private Eyes: A Journey from the 1980s to the 1930s

by Don McGregor

…in which the writer of this series goes on about his love for Private Eye stories and how he sold this story to Dick Giordano. He also mentions how much he enjoys working with Gene Colan.