This week’s lead review for Wednesday Comics is TRUE KVLT #5, a finale for the fast food heist comics from IDW Publishing. In addition, the Wednesday Comics Team has a rundown of the new #1s and finales from non-Big 2 publishers, all of which you can find below … enjoy!
True Kvlt #5
Co-Creator/Artist: Liana Kangas
Co-Creator/Writer: Scott Bryan Wilson
Colors: Gab Contreras
Letters: DC Hopkins
Promotion/Branding: Jazzlyn Stone
Color Assists: Jimmy Savage
Publisher: IDW Publishing
I love when a book’s total end product equals its thematic depth, whether intentional or not. Sometimes I feel it is not always about every stop along the way, but rather that we arrived to our destination at all. In Trve Kvlt’s initial Kickstarter run, co-creators Liana Kangas and Scott Bryan Wilson pitched the book’s themes as “apathy and unhappiness and the need to sometimes reset everything,” and I cannot agree more.
Trve Kvlt is all the more stronger for this, to be quite honest.
If you enjoyed the four issue self-published run thanks to Jazzlyn Stone’s brilliant marketing stratagem or found yourself drawn to the five issue monthly from IDW, let’s catch up on these home fries: Marty, our career fast food clerk, plots a caper for his lunch break in #1. But plans, as they so often do, go awry resulting in him and Alison (she’s new here) getting kidnapped by The Church of The Immortal Heartbeat (read: a cult). In #2, Bernice, Marty’s co-worker/bff, tracks down the two while they are interrogated, gaslit, and blackmailed into doing some lite assassination. In #3, Marty and Alison infiltrate the cult HQ while Bernice roughs up a cult usurper who goes by Veronika. By #4, Satan is summoned from a 45, Bernice and Veronika make way to the rescue, and Marty/Alison get the hell out of dodge! It is here in issue #5 where there is a marked departure from what has become Trve Kvlt’s norm.
What Team Kvlt serves in their first four is nothing short of a consummate consommé of comics. Kangas lays a foundation of efficient and communicative page layouts, sacrificing lineart for clever cinematography and purposeful character acting. Wilson pipes enough near-autobiographical monologues and food critique that immersion is not an aspiration but what grounds the increasingly ludicrous farce. DC Hopkins’ word balloons season the negative space in Kangas’ layouts with such deft hands that you forget how many of them blow past 28 words a balloon to be entranced in how many of them nail conversational pacing. Colorist Gab Contreras and color-assist Jimmy Savage jack the spice levels of Kangas’ inks into an immaculately subversive tone for a book about the woes of minimum wage labor and how dead-end mentality oppresses (or gets folks to join a cult!). Who knew a book about apathy and the pitfalls of manual labor would be so vibrant, well planned, and efficiently produced!
But in issue #5, plans — as they so often do — go awry…even for our Team Kvlt (and Trve Kvlt is all the more stronger for this)!
Gone are the carefully laid balloons, instead replaced with some compromises that unintentionally confuse reading order and return us to our disbelief. Gone are the clever page layouts, instead scrounging and settling for four wide panels that stagnate the climax. Gone are the dramatic color moods, instead relying on gradients and glows to make the supernatural elements pop at the cost of tone. Gone is the pacing we got used to, replaced with denouement focused on subverting its own loose ends to the point its ending leaves a bitter and trite taste that was frankly absent in all previous issues.
The burger flipping heist book starts much like fast food: promising, provocative, filling. Then, as we dive into its morsels, it is tasty, wants to be consumed, and demands our hunger. But near the end of its offerings, it sits heavy, greasy, laden with fluff that at once felt attractive, and finishes with an unsatisfying palate. For a book about apathy, it took my earnest ear and my unending enthusiasm only to leave me reeling and a little longing– not for more, but for a second try at the ending.
Like I said, I love when a book’s total end product equals its thematic depth, whether intentional or not, and I truly cannot wait for Team Kvlt’s next work.
Verdict: BUY
Groo: Gods Against Groo #1
Wednesday Comics Quick Hits
- Dead Seas #1 (IDW Publishing): In Dead Seas, ghosts have started appearing on earth and they need busting! We follow two prisoners as they fly out to a large cargo ship. On the ship though, they discover that a big corporation has been trapping ghosts and experimenting on them. To shave time off their sentence, they collect ectoplasm. But goddamn does it go wrong fast. Written by Cavan Scott, the story is dense from the start. We get caught up on the state of the world, and the family of one of the prisoners, before we get to the ship itself, and the corporation. The artwork, by Nick Brokenshire, has a nice adventure comics feel that contrasts well with the neon aura of the ghosts. Although there are a lot of words on the page, it never feels overwhelming, thanks to some good work by letterer Shawn Lee, who finds a good balance between multiple linking bubbles and the space in each panel. Dead Seas #1 is a hell of a start to what is bound to be an escalation of violence as these prisoners start to confront the guards, and survive some ghosts! (Michael Kurt)
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic – 10th Anniversary Edition (IDW Publishing): I can’t believe it’s been 10 years since IDW published the first issue of Friendship Is Magic. I remember going to the LCS to pick up issue #1 because I was a fan of Hasbro’s sherbet-colored ponies with bright manes as a kid. Immediately, the story of female friendship and bright, cartoony art style grabbed my interest, and I followed the series for a while. As I got more involved in the fandom, I learned there was a dark side to it, not the Bronies themselves (I am a proud furry) but a subsection of the Bronies. There was a very vocal contingent of racist, antisemitic, anti-LGBTQ Bronies, so I left fandom and stopped reading the comics (a.k.a. the MLP Nazi problem). It’s been 8 years since then, yet Ponygate still takes up space in the tenth-anniversary issue of Friendship Is Magic…and I’m very glad it did. “Written by Spike,” by Jeremy Whitley (writer), Andy Price (artist), Heather Breckel (colorist), and Neil Uyetake (letterer), is the third (very meta) story in the issue and addresses the toxic white male Bronies head on. Eight years later, it finally put a small bandaid over some old wounds. Also contributing to stories in the tenth-anniversary issue are other Friendship Is Magic alum, including Katie Cook (writer) and Robbie Robbins (letterer). (Rebecca Oliver Kaplan)
- Star Trek: Strange New Worlds: The Illyrian Enigma #1 (IDW Publishing): While I expected this issue to follow-up on some of the plot threads from the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episode “Ghosts of Illyria,” I was excited to see that it not only directly continued that storyline, but is set after the events of the SNW season finale. Further still, connecting the main plot of the miniseries to the Star Trek: Enterprise season 3 episode “Damage” immediately adds narrative complications, considering Captain Archer justified some pretty ignoble actions against the Illyrians when making First Contact. This issue gives every crew member on Pike’s season 1 Enterprise (and Admiral April) a moment to shine – plus showcases plenty of the ship, from the mess hall to the ready room to Pike’s Quarters. This is an extremely “satisfying chunk” and a promising first issue for a miniseries that is poised to stand as a worthy “eleventh episode” of SNW – no small praise, considering the quality of the show. Written by Kristin Beyer and Mike Johnson, with art by Megan Levens, colors by Charlie Kirchoff, and letters by Neil Uyetake, this opening has me looking forward to The Illyrian Enigma #2. Plus: the Lower Decks-style variant cover conceived of and created by Chris Fenoglio features Pike’s hair peak… and it’s just as breathtaking as you might imagine. (Avery Kaplan)
- Stuff of Nightmares #4 (BOOM! Studios): Stuff of Nightmares concludes as R.L. Stine ties up all the loose ends in its fourth and final issue; allowing an exploration of the nature of monsters, who creates them, and how we define them as a society and a culture. Complicity creates more monsters and the nature of fame, spectacle, and notoriety serve to feed them. The letters of Jim Campbell are seamless and expressive, adding to the already distinct voices of the characters on the pages. Where the colorist on the previous issues was Roman Titov; this time it’s Goncalo Lopes bringing color into the work of A.L. Kaplan whose creeping spot blacks have been a treat and heightened the horror created in the series. The colors compliment the line work here and it’s a transition that feels natural as the whole creative team brings this R.L. Stein nightmare to an exciting close. (Khalid Johnson)
- Vanish #4 (Image Comics): This issue by Donny Cates, Ryan Stegman, JP Mayer, Sonia Oback and John J. Hill brings the title to the end of its first arc. And like all the issues before it, it’s filled with the kind of propulsive narrative and eye-popping art that the Cates-Stegman team are known for. If you haven’t been reading Vanish, the story involves Oliver Harrison, who was once a young wizard/magician attending a magical academy in the Harry Potter vein. Like Potter, Oliver had to face a terrifying villain — Vanish. But instead of using magic to defeat Vanish, Oliver pulled a gun and shot Vanish. Now grown, Oliver must contend with the returning accomplices of Vanish, who have used their magic to become superheroes in the human world. It’s a great concept, and Cates and Stegman bring out the best in each other. What started with a bang (literally) led to a slow burn before this action-packed fourth issue. This issue is the most gruesome and visceral yet, with Oliver facing off against a hulking villain named Battery, whose ties to Vanish are very personal. The fight is beautifully illustrated, delivering the kind of visceral thrills of the early years of Spawn or Faust, two titles I think heavily influenced Vanish. Cates also injects some of his usual themes, like addiction, family and making amends for the past, that help elevate the story from just a 90s/”outlaw comics” pastiche. The issue also ends on one hell of a cliffhanger. A definite MUST BUY. (Manny Gomez)
- The Witcher: The Ballad of Two Wolves #1 (Dark Horse Comics): The story told in this comic — as scripted by Bartosz Sztybor — was one I had not expected from a media tie-in comic, and it was the unexpected aspects I think worked best. Without outright spoiling the plot, I never thought I’d see Geralt of Rivia and his faithful bard/best friend Dandelion dealing with an issue stemming from an amalgamation of famous Grimm Fairy Tales. These are applied to real-world social issues such as gentrification and land rights. Art and colors from Miki Montlló sing off the page in stylistic splashes and expressive characters as intricate as Dandelion’s own ballads. Accompanying these displays are letters from the ever-talented Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou, who breathes life into the book with standout lettering through explosive lyrics paired with Montlló’s ballad splashes, as well as with the subtle use of lowercase to distinguish the tone being used by characters as they whisper to each other from panel to panel. Fans of The Witcher and those just diving into the wider world should stick around as Geralt and Dandelion find themselves once again thrust into the worst-case scenario as they simply try to make some money and survive. (Bryan Reheil)
Wednesday Comics is edited by Zack Quaintance.
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