Dark Blood #2
Boom! Studios
Writer: Latoya Morgan
Artists: Walt Barna & Moises Hidalgo
I have a confession. I didn’t read issue 1 of Dark Blood. But, you know what? it didn’t matter. Dark Blood #2 is so tight, well written, and illustrated, that I was catapulted into the story and invested in the character from the third play* page.
*This issue starts with visions. Certainly divine, and perhaps a little contrived. Dreams are used so often in fiction of all mediums, starting a story (even a second issue of a comic) with a dream can be dicy. It’s easy to lose the reader quickly because, while dreams may give readers insight into a character’s mental state, it is a sad, cliche way to convey backstory. Luckily, the dream/vision lasts a solid two pages before the issue presents the meat of the story.
Something I appreciate a lot about this issue is how grounded it is in reality. This issue takes place in Alabama, 1955, with short, sporadic cuts (or flashbacks) to 1945, when the protagonist was fighting in Austria during the Second World War. There are allusions to the bus boycotts at the onset of the civil rights movement. The tension within this issue is deeply personal to the protagonist. It centers on pain. Physical pain from a war wound and emotional/psychological pain of racism in the American south.
Much of this issue dedicates page space to dialogue between the protagonist and his wife. His war wound causes chronic pain and his wife constantly asks him to seek help for it from a doctor. The dynamic between husband and wife, as well as the bit of page space their daughter gets, is no contrivance. It’s difficult to portray family dynamics in comic books due to the expectations readers have of the medium. Fast-paced. Action-oriented. However, each character feels real and the dialogue doesn’t feel rushed or stilted.
Like any comic that flows well, the lettering feels invisible. The eye drifts across panels and pages, never searching for what comes next. Dark Blood #2 reads intuitively. The most notable triumph, when it comes to lettering, is the captions. They are sparse throughout the issue, but that leads them to carry a weight that is foreboding.
The art, itself, is appropriate for the content. Character design is on point in terms of the 1950s era. The panels are blocked out well so there’s little question where the eye is meant to travel. Something of interest is that two artists worked on this piece, and one for only a handful of pages. On my first read, I didn’t clock the difference in style, but when I went back and looked, I found I enjoyed the more impressionistic style that was less common than the more realistic style that is more common.
