Titan Comics 2018
Created by Ben Aaronovitch
Written by Andrew Cartmel
Illustrated by Lee Sullivan
Coloured by Paulina Vassileva
Lettered by Rob Steen
Detective Inspector Peter Grant was right to believe that there was something off about the mysterious new drug doing the rounds at parties. Goblin girl, Lana Blanding, confirmed it to be “werelight weed”, seemingly grown by magic. That’s as much information as Lana was willing to part with for free. Clever girl, Lana – but not clever enough to know that working both sides would land her in hospital. The werelight weed is being distributed by boat along the Thames, but the main source is still unknown. What Peter does know, however, is that there is an office in Teddington which acts as a staging area for distributing the drugs. He also knows that the dealers are scared shitless of their supplier: a woman covered in face tattoos known as the Hoodette.
I could give you a myriad of reasons why you should be reading this but I will tell you why I do and hopefully during the course of this you might find one that suits you as well. There is a part of me that thinks with a wizarding world in London this could be verging on Dresden meets Harry franchises but it doesn’t. While the magic and magical creatures serve storylines well they don’t make them the true focus of the story. I just happen to be a man who is Jewish it doesn’t define me but it’s a part of who I am and that’s what the magic is like here.
I think the way that this is structured is extremely well done. The opening takes us back to when Gina Penlaw was brought into the whole operation and by that well you’ll have to see to understand what I mean. I will say that the characterisation for her in this bit is so much fun to see and it says a little something about human nature in the process. Plus it gives us a chance to see Hoodette in action a bit more and find some understanding of what she’s about. Not much mind you but enough so that we definitely are intrigued to find out more. Which is something we share in common with DI Grant.
I am such a fan of the interiors here and the crisp clean linework that by varying the weight of it can create those nice subtle moments that almost go unnoticed or those bold ones like with the face tattoo. The utilisation of page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels shows off a nice solid eye for storytelling. Backgrounds are utilised well here too which expands the moments beautifully and they also manage to show the size and scope of the city around them while adding emotion and feeling to what we see. The creativity and imagination we see, particularly at The Chestnut Tree, is superb. I mean everything we see is brought to life amazingly well and the colours are solid, bold and beautiful and they can as subtle as needed too, see backyard encounter.
DI Grant and his boss are lured to a site to be ambushed by the Hoodette’s goons. I love that these coppers are so caught up in what they do that they are so easily caught like this is more interesting than you’d expect it to be. There is a very delicious irony to this part that I absolutely adore and it’s going to get better when the next issue hits. What I really like about this franchise is that while it’s nice to read each arc you don’t have to to enjoy the one you’ve got in front of you. Each one is new reader friendly which is just an added bonus if you never read this but have thought about it and been intimidated by entering a franchise late.