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HELLBLAZER #166
"Highwater Part Three of Four"
Highly Recommended (9/10)
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DC Comics/Vertigo imprint
Writer: Brian Azzarello
Artist: Marcelo Frusin
Colors: James Sinclair & Zylonol
Letters: Clem Robins
Editor: Will Dennis
Price: $2.50 US/$4.25 CAN |
As with almost every story Azzarello has told on Hellblazer,
my final feelings on the book are going to come down to how he handles the
ending. But so far, I'm really enjoying "Highwater" as it contains the elements
required to make this book work. There's a fair bit of horror, but there's also
a lot of manipulation going on, and I'm not entirely sure what Constantine is up
to. Frusin does some truly chilling work on the horrific moments in this issue,
and Azzarello is doing an equally good job of showing the racist philosophy and
its underpinnings without making it ridiculously evil or hard to understand.
It's creepier than just having mindless thugs running around beating up people
different from them, although no less horrible or evil, and I'm looking forward
to the retribution that I expect will come in the next issue.
The narration over the story
as it begins has been an effective tool for this story, especially as we never
know who is spouting the racist philosophy. It serves as a reminder of the
pervasive attitudes, as well as being a powerful reinforcement of the story and
its themes, even as Frusin is giving us images that show the effects of the
attitudes. In this particular issue, the image is vivid and powerful, with no
detail spared in making us envision the appearance and even smell of that image.
Contrasting this horrific image with a beautiful, innocent young girl and her
seriously wrong reaction to it makes for even more chilling reading.
Over the last couple of
issues, Azzarello has mostly been setting up Gage and his flunkies, showing us
the way things are. John's role has been mostly peripheral, but this issue he
becomes considerably more involved, and his actions are exactly what I would
expect from him. He's willing to do some nasty things and consort with some
awful people if the end result is going to be their elimination. I love the fact
that he plays every person involved, from Gage to his flunkies to the guy at the
end of the phone, and none of them realize they are being played.
Another impressive thing about
this issue is that Azzarello and Frusin have shown us that this world, while
violent and ugly, isn't that far removed from our own. The scene with the
husband, wife and baby shows a tenderness you would expect from any young
couple, and the guys are after all simply hanging out in a bar. Then we get a
cinematic sequence, with the narration superimposed over some violent images
that would be in slow motion in a film, that reminds us of the violence that
lurks beneath the surface.
While the last two issues were
setting and setup for that, this issue is setup for Constantine's schemes. Now
that everything is in place, I expect we'll see a horrific set of repercussions
next issue, and I'm curious as to whether Constantine is going to be able to
re-educate his friend or if she'll be going down with the rest of them.
Email Randy Lander comments about this review. |
