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| Shadowman #2 Cover by Jon Davis-Hunt |
With Valiant's comics strictly limited to twenty pages, departing Senior Editor Heather Antos made excellent use of her inside front covers. On series like Savage, X-O Manowar, and Quantum & Woody, she used social media-style posts to bring readers up to speed, enabling us to begin reading each new issue without wondering:
"Um, what was it that happened in last issue?"
In Shadowman #2, Heather gives us a full-page recap from the wily and colorful King of the Deadside: Baron Samedi. What better way to begin reading a horror comic?
On the first page, we meet a family. They seem quite ordinary. But little signs in their words and actions seem...wrong.
The father, driving along this lonely stretch of road, slows when he spots a hitchhiker. Perhaps he's motivated merely by compassion. Perhaps he feels the stories of violence and tragedy concerning hitchhikers are overblown.
Still, he's the protector of his family. He's miles from anyone and everything. And he seems unconcerned about the dangers the hitchhiker might present to his family.
He regards the hitchhiker as a novelty.
Hm. Remind me. When did hitchhikers become an endangered species?
The children also seem unafraid. But how can the son have never heard about hiphikers?
Sorry: hitchhikers.
Predictably, when the hitchhiker lives up to the worst stereotypes,
the mother reveals that her family is far from ordinary.
You know: the family that kills together...
Enoch: a ghost town in Arizona. Long abandoned.
The family is traveling there. The hitchhiker is traveling there. And now, so is Shadowman and his new best-frenemy Baron Samedi.
Immediately, Shadowman senses something in the town. Like the family traveling in the station wagon, the town seems familiar, but also alien.
He takes a step into the Deadside, to discover that demons inhabit the town that humans abandoned.
Enoch: a man who walked with God. A man who never died.
The Hebrew Bible (or Old Testament) records that he was taken directly to Heaven. Religious leaders attributed books to him, some of which can be found in the Apocrypha of a Catholic Bible. Scholars taught that he became the guardian of the celestial treasures, that he learned all mysteries, and became commander of God's angels.
Yet according to the medieval French Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki, better known by his acronym Rashi, God removed Enoch from the Earth to save this righteous man from returning to evil.
Perhaps God should have removed the town of Enoch from our world too. For whatever evil it might have allowed once, the town now seems consumed by it.
As our protector, Shadowman cannot feel fear as ordinary humans do. Still, he can sense evil, and it disgusts him.
Shadowman must fight a battle in Enoch. There will be violence. There will be blood. Yet Shadowman #2 also asks: How much are we responsible for the evil in our world?
Like the family who allowed the hitchhiker into their car, in what ways do we invite evil into our hearts, where unwatched and unguarded against, it may eventually thrive?
Shadowman #2 entertains with thoughtful plot and dialogue by Cullen Bunn. Amid the drama and the battle, penciler and inker Jon Davis-Hunt delivers a believable and immersive experience. The issue glows with beautiful coloring by Jordie Bellaire and the artistic lettering of Clayton Cowles. The creative team combine their talents into a symphony of horror.
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| Shadowman #2 Cover B by Caspar Wijngaard |
And then, there are the haunting and appealing covers.
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| Shadowman #2 Cover C (Horror Cover) by Francesco Francavilla |
All affordable, and most likely, obtainable.
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| Shadowman #2 Pre-Order Cover by Annie Wu |
The Book of Enoch relates how evil came into our world, and how it made the Biblical flood necessary. Shadowman #2 reveals the devastation that evil can still wreak in our world when you allow it a foothold in your heart.
Protect thyself from evil. Read Shadowman #2.
Dragon Dave
