Image Comics 2019
Written by Jeff Lemire
Pencilled by Phil Hester
Inked by Eric Gapstur
Coloured by Ryan Cody
Lettered by Steve Wands
Loretta and her family are surrounded by deadly cultists and running out of time when Grandpa Judd arrives toting his ornery attitude and his trusty shotgun. But what good is a gun against a mysterious ailment turning his granddaughter into a tree?
Wow oh these boys certainly know how to play! The concept is great and the disease is real though somehow in this form probably taken to an extreme is not. Regardless I love how taking something as obscure as Lewandowsky-Lustz dysplasia and turned into a black-ops, see men in black, coming to abscond with the person who suffers from it. This makes me want to know more and the way that this opens up with a rare condition with men after her for reasons unknown well that's the way it needed to be.
The way that this is being told is pretty brilliant. The story & plot development we see through the sequence of events unfolding and how the reader learns information is just sensational. This issue expands on that and yet still doesn't a darn thing and it's this that really makes the story what it is. The character development is interesting. Grandpa Judd gets a bit of a spotlight here and we see the kids father as well and this just makes him more approachable and likeable. The pacing is amazing and seeing how all this plays out through the twists and turns helping to create the books ebb & flow is dramatic and fierce.
I like how this book opens and how we see Judd is with his son a year prior to now is amazing to see. Not only how far along the disease has progressed but the overall way that it plays out for us is stunning. We're still left with as much information about who they are and why they want them but that continues to build the intrigue factor here. There is also an amazing amount of tension and comfortableness that we see mainly among the family that bleeds out to the reader. Jeff's already one of today's most prolific writers and he's yet to disappoint in any way shape or form, this, this might be my favourite book of his.
The interiors here are interesting to say the least. Part of me wanted to see more attention to detail and to see the condition in hyper realism. Honesty though that's not Phil's forte and we all know that. So his style here actually works extremely well here. He makes this his and we see just enough of the detail to get it and understand what we're seeing. There is also something about seeing Darcy that is as fascinating as the writing is so yeah god bless Phil for what he's able to do. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a superb eye for storytelling. Normally I am clambering for more backgrounds and while I would here there is something about the way the page layouts are utilised and how much backgrounds there are that just works in all the right ways. The colour work is intriguing and the way that we see these darker more muted tones actually make this feel much more dark and dangerous and I kind of like that. Plus there are moments that we see patterns in colours that are created like that hint of plaid or the way that blood on the ground stands out.
I super duper intrigued by this book. Yeah we see violence and some questionable language and there are so many unanswered questions but it doesn't matter. What these gents deliver is some of the most intense storytelling that captures the readers' mind, imagination and engages them into an off the page beautifully.