IDW Publishing 2017
Written by Mike Casey & Arvind Ethan David
Illustrated by Brendan Cahill
Coloured by Joana LaFuente
Lettered by Shawn Lee
When the demons came, humanity reluctantly learned to share the world with another sentient race. Eighty years later, this uneasy co-existence has spawned an endless terrorist conflict. Detective Daniel Aston, charged with being the thin blue line between the two sides, is tested to the limit when a demon sets up house inside his soul. But to save his daughter, he'll pay any price—including genocide.
Well well well I wasn’t quite sure how this was going to go but that didn’t really matter when Mike’s involved you know it’s going to be interesting. It certainly is too as we see a world where the Shaitan and humans live side by side creating a new world order. Of course the old one is still kind of in place as well but the difference is that certain humans have embraced being merged with demons. So what does that mean? Humans merging with Demons well simply put a corrupt human who accepts a demon to host well let’s just say that bad guys well that takes on a whole new meaning.
There’s also an interesting look at prejudice here too. Makes me think it’s almost human nature to think ill of someone different than yourself. Are there exceptions to every rule sure but are there enough to change the way you think is doubtful at least that’s what i’m seeing here. I do really like the characterisation here between father and daughter as we get to see first hand how such prejudices can worm their way into a Detective’s mind. Then again when you see the same types of people doing the crimes over and over again it’s easy to see why you think and feel the way you do.
There is some beautiful work happening on the interiors here. We get to see creativity and imagination on full display with the depiction of these demons. There’s some really nice attention to detail here and I have to say i’m pretty impressed with the use of backgrounds in this book! They do a great job of setting the stage and telling the bigger picture and we need to see more of that. The page layout with their angles and perspective well well utilised so the flow visually is very strong. Brendan and Joana make a solid team on this one.
That Mike and Arvind are able to keep us surprised by the turning of events and waste no time in setting things up for us is fantastic. There’s a bit of a mystery about what’s going on and who intends for what to happen and while as a reader we can speculate that draws us into the story further. The way the story itself flows is extremely well done and it’s easy to see why an event happens and what that will mean for a character moving forward.
From premise, set-up to execution this is an incredibly strong first issue that engages the reader and makes them think beyond the scope of the story while keeping them entertained.