Two hundred issues of horror is really something to brag about in this day and age of super-hero dominance, but what made this title so engaging at the best of times was, among other factors, the sheer cunning and brilliance of the main character. John Constantine is a screwup and a bastard, sure, but he's fun to read about because he always ends up five steps ahead of any adversary, infernal or otherwise. And that's where this special issue goes awry. The reader is ahead of the protagonist, who fails to clue in on the true nature of what he's experiencing. Still, it's an absolute treat to see Steve Dillon handle the character again, and the sheer depressing nature of the plotlines is classic Constantine as well.
John Constantine finds himself living a life he never thought possible. He's married to his beloved Kit, and they have a young son. And further into the future, he's married to Zed, and their son Saul has a promising future and career ahead of him. And further still, he's married and working in a chip stand, and his teenage daughter is the picture of normalcy. But in the world of John Constantine, nothing is as it seems.
Steve Dillon drawing a middle-aged John Constantine, complete with a paunch? Wonderful. He captures Kit's simple beauty while hinting at the corruption that lies beneath the surface quite well. Dillon's work is so strong and direct, though, that it makes Marcelo Frusin's and Leonardo Manco's work pale in comparison. Frusin's work is sketchier than it used to be, and that lack of definition works against the inky, dark atmosphere he's usually able to establish with ease. Manco's work is clear and detailed, but his work here, and on this series in general, just hasn't stood out like previous efforts I've enjoyed from him, most from Marvel, if memory serves.
The storytelling is most clear in the first sequence, and not just because it's illustrated by Dillon. The normalcy that has crept into John's life is most prevalent here, and the air of tragedy is greater because he has a more widely embraced notion of happiness within his grasp. Furthermore, the vision of evil in the child in this sequence is the most unsettling because he's the youngest of the Constantine children we see. The plot also makes a brief reference to the title character's origins in Alan Moore's Swamp Thing, but at this point, it's a rather obscure reference that gets in the way of the story rather than enhancing it.
The story's fairly accessible, otherwise. It helps to know of Constantine's past, but it's not necessary. In fact, the story's so straightforward that it's a bit obvious... so obvious that it's hard to accept that John doesn't figure out he's being manipulated. The reader had that figured out by the time the second "lifetime" rolls around. For the plot to work, one has to accept the hero's a bit dim, easily manipulated. The whole idea of the character is that he's the manipulator and that he's been around the block more than a few times.
