Comic Review: Hidden Society #2

Hidden Society #2

Dark Horse

Writer: Rafael Scavone

Artist: Rafael Albuquerque & Marcelo Costa

Hidden Society debuted last month and I had high expectations for the new miniseries. Most of the hype was drummed up by artist Rafael Albuquerque, who is one of the best artists in the industry. While a few pieces of the new fantasy series are interesting enough, the first issue struggled to build an interesting cast of characters. It also failed to build a strong foundation for a four-issue miniseries. Still, I had hope that the series would start heading in the right direction with the second issue.

If the first issue failed to establish an effective tone and noteworthy characters, the second fails to do anything with those characters. A clear antagonist is established in this issue, and while the forces of evil have neat designs, they are rather generic “Magic baddies” looking to snuff out the hidden order of heroes. The plot is so generic that it is hard to get excited about anything that happens from panel to panel.

Writer Rafael Scavone clearly wanted to put together a group of misfits to save the world in this series. While this cookie-cutter scenario can usually work out well for a plot, it just falls flat in Hidden Society #2. The characters don’t get along, which is fine, but they have no chemistry at the same time. The banter and conversations aren’t at all interesting, and most of the dialogue only exists to build the world for the reader in a rather clunky way. The writing feels frantic and just unnatural throughout.

All of this is a shame because Hidden Society continues to look great. Both Rafael Albuquerque and Marcelo Costa do great things for this issue. The character designs are incredible. The world around the characters looks great, even if there aren’t too many changes in settings in this issue. The creative doesn’t quite get the opportunity to showcase their talents in this issue because of how still the script is, which is a shame. Still, this is a great looking issue overall, but the art alone isn’t worth the price of admission.

Hidden Society is a fantastic looking book that is just boring to read. We’ve seen this story before, and Rafael Scavone is simply unable to take the tropes he is working with and make them feel fresh for the reader. Unless you are heavily invested in the art, this series is likely going to be a pass.

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