Love Everlasting #1, Tom King, Elsa Charretier, Matt Hollingsworth, Clayton Cowles, Image
Sometimes coming to a new comic series cold, is great. It’s a new story, with new characters, and is meant to be read that way. In the case of Love Everlasting, the only reason I picked it up was the names of the writer and artist. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be caught dead reading a fucking romance comic.
Love Everlasting is a new series from Tom King and Elsa Charretier, that first appeared on their Substack. It’s billed as a horror romance story. It centers around a young woman named Joan. At first it, seems like a straightforward romance story in the 1950’s, where a secretary falls in love with her boss (George). Again, why am I reading this? However, the story jumps around in time, and is as confusing for the reader, as it is to Joan. She keeps being thrown into new romantic relationships with different men in different eras, with some lingering memories of the men in her past/future.
It reminds me a bit of someone watching WandaVision with no context for the story, thinking it’s a 1950’s show, reminiscent of Leave it to Beaver, and thinking “Why should I care about this?” But as with WandaVision, you notice that something is not quite right about the story, and it slowly becomes more and more menacing.
By the second chapter in this issue, Joan is falling in love with a rock singer (Kit) in New York, but starts to have these quick flashes of panic about which man she loves, and why she can’t remember the previous chapter of her life:“I’m not in love with George! I don’t know who the #%#@ George is!! I love Kit!!”
In the third chapter, in the Old West, she’s tired of the same romance story playing out, over and over, and jumps onto a horse and rides out into the desert. In subverting the expected outcome of acting out another romance story, it ends badly for her. On the final page, once again thrown into a new love story, she finally says, “Ah, fuck.”
In a way, Joan feels a lot like the reader might feel reading these chapters, like “Great, here she goes again with the love and the romance… yadda yadda yadda” And by the end, you’re thinking “fuck this.” I enjoyed the first issue of Love Everlasting, but being more of a horror comic fan, I can’t wait for things to come crashing down. King and Charretier also seem to enjoy doing that. On the surface this is a tired romance story, on the other hand, something is definitely not right, so let’s burn it all down.
Eight Billion Genies #4, Charles Soule, Ryan Browne, Image
The earth’s population is down to about 1 billion (and falling) because most people’s wishes end up getting them (or others) killed. We’re at week two of the genie era, and as you can ascertain from the population and it’s not going particularly well.
And yet, The Lampwick Bar and Grill is still a safe haven for those inside. For Robbie, who ventured off a super hero, his goal was to find a safe place for himself and his parents. In doing so, however, he gets caught up fighting villains alongside other super heroes. He quickly finds that being an actual super hero does not live up to his expectations. His friends are dying and there is no end to the villains and monsters he must fight. However, by the end of the issue, he might have found the place that he was looking for.
For those still inside the bar, Brian proposes that they start getting to know each other better. We hear Brian and Alex’s stories, we hear from Robbie’s mom and dad, and finally Alex in a drunken stupor ask the bartender about himself. What he reveals changes the course of the things for everyone in the bar, and will have major implications for this story going forward.
As always, this story is endlessly enjoyable. Charles Soule and Ryan Browne make a great team. In four issues they’ve created a world of its own, and one that we wouldn’t necessarily like to live in. It’s fun to watch the earth’s population dwindle down within a matter of weeks, and what this means for the survivors.
Mindset #2, Zack Kaplan, John Pearson, Vault
The previous issue found Ben and his friends making a breakthrough in discovering the sound and light frequency needed to produce mind control. They start experimenting more on each other, using juvenile pranks like lighting their own pants on fire, punching a wall, etc. Then they discover how to synthesize the frequency into an app on a phone. At that point they decide to go out into the world to conduct some field experiments.
They start at a big graduation party, telling people to take their clothes off. Then on to an exclusive Silicon Valley party to mess with the elite of the tech world. While the rest of the group turns this straight party into a wild mess, Ben meets Atlanta Hanna. She is the host of the party, who sees that Ben and friends don’t belong there. Ben is struck right away by her beauty and intelligence, and her lack of playing along with his excuses for being there. We know from the first issue that she will play an important part in how this story ends.
After taking an expensive car for a joyride, the gang find themselves in jail. Shortly after, Ben has a fantastic idea for the technology. It harkens back to his original idea for creating an app that will free the user from the effects that technology has on their lives. Essentially he wants to use mind control to free people from the influence of their own phones. Again, from the beginning of the first issue, we know this is all going to end badly, but it’s really interesting to see how it’s all going to play out in the meantime.
There’s Something Wrong With Patrick Todd #2, Ed Brisson, Gavin Guidry, Aftershock
In the first issue we saw Patrick Todd completely in control, using his mind magic to force criminals to rob banks for him, and then turn themselves in. At the end of the issue he gets attacked, and we get a glimpse of someone much worse on the horizon. In this issue, Patrick’s luck has changed, and he wakes up on the floor of the motel room, having been robbed of his laptop and all of the money he’s been saving up for his mother’s care.
The detective, Brad, finds out that there have been a string of murders, which line up exactly with the locations of the bank robberies he’s been investigating. He thinks that the person responsible for the robberies has also been murdering people. This connection tells us that Zeus has been tracking down Patrick in each of these places. We also see the consequences for the three men that robbed Patrick of his money. One of them gives the detective a bit of information about Patrick that may help with the case.
Patrick uses his powers to secure another laptop, but then sees a flier with his picture and name and someone asking for them to call with information about “my son.” This throws Patrick, as he knows it can’t be his mother. We finally do get a look at Zeus and what he’s capable of. By the end, Patrick is compelled to call the number and Zeus picks up.
Ed Brisson is a great storyteller and this series has been a lot of fun. I really like the pace of this book because a lot has happened in just two issues. Gavin Guidry’s artwork is awesome! I have not seen any of the other books he’s worked on in the past. I’m really excited to read the next issue where Patrick will seemingly go head-to-head with Zeus.
Absolution #2, Peter Milligan, Mike Deodato, Lee Loughridge, AWA Upshot
In the previous issue, we were introduced to Nina, a trained assassin, who is trying to reach absolution, by getting approval from her followers on social media. If not, small bombs inside her brain will explode, killing her slowly and painfully. In this issue, she starts in her escape house, treating her various wounds from the previous kill. Quickly she’s out again on a personal mission to kill the crime family that she grew up with. There’s something really interesting about having to kill people in the most creative way possible, to satisfy your followers and the talking heads judging her every move.
Nina works her way up slowly from the lowest level gangsters up through the top. There are a few times when she hesitates before a kill, because she realizes that it’s the more human thing to do. The cold-blooded killer part of her brain was removed during her surgery, so all that’s left it was she was trained to do as an assassin. After successfully taking down the family, her absolution score jumps way up. However, the television personalities watching her, have a problem with the people she decided to kill, and her score suffers from that. She can’t please everyone and she resolves to be more careful about who she chooses should die, going forward.
Another story is happening at the same time, which is that one of her followers begins appealing to Nina for help. The woman is being sexually assaulted by her employer and she’s feeling suicidal. She repeats over and over that she wishes she was more like Nina, so that she could protect herself. Nina initially sees this as a distraction, but by the end of the story it sounds like she’s heard enough, and is ready to take action to help.
I wasn’t totally sure about the first issue, because I thought the characters were pretty generic. However, the idea of a future where your life and death are judged by social media and celebrity hosts, was really inventive. The second issue is a lot more fun, since we start seeing the more human side of Nina. Also, the premise has been laid out and we can just enjoy Nina killing bad guys in different ways. In some ways, we are like her followers, sitting back and enjoying the kill show. I’ll definitely be reading on after this, as the story has me hooked.
Cover The Dead With Lime #1, Jonathan Chance, Hernan Gonzalez, Damian Felitte, Drew Lenhart, Blood Moon Comics
This story begins in England in 1665, with a serene fishing trip with a father and his son. Based on the cover, I didn’t think that this calm would last very long. A large ship pulls up on the dock and you see a rat scurrying off the ship, with a shrill scream. That is basically the turning point in the story. Flash forward to 1666, and all of the people in the town are sick and coughing, and it seems like the Black Plague has arrived to swallow up the population there.
Enter The Doktor, seemingly a man, dressed in a dark cloak and a terrifying mask that makes him look like a demon. He enters a home, where he’s been called upon to cure a woman’s daughter. He takes a look at the daughter, locked in her room, through a peephole, and is able to determine that her sickness is past curing. He takes care of the daughter, who is frighteningly possessed, and then is attacked by the mother who has the same illness. After this, we get a reveal of the Doktor’s identity, but I won’t spoil that here.
We flash backward to the father from the beginning of the story, who’s been called upon to tend to a sick town, through a letter. There’s an Old Yeller-type scene before he departs, that’s much more terrifying than the 1957 film. The father then departs into the night on horseback, where the story ends.
I really enjoyed this first issue. It takes a historically accurate period of time in England, and steps up the horror elements, taking some terrifying liberties taken on the details of what happened there. I loved the character of The , as healer and butcher. The artwork really shines when the violence is taken up a notch. They’ve also managed to take two separate years and tied the characters together to make them more sympathetic. I am looking forward to reading the next issue to see where the next horror will take us.