By: Tim Seeley (writer), Daniel Leister (art), Mark Englert (colors), Crank! (letters) & James Lowder (edits)
The Story: Where did Vlad (Cassie Hack’s hulking companion) come from?
What’s Good: I don’t think it would be a stretch to say that all Hack/Slash fans love Vlad. To me, Vlad has become the heart of the overall series with his tireless efforts to stand by Cassie through thick and thin, protecting her from danger, keeping her sane and (of course) helping her to kill bad guys.
Before now, we really didn’t know where Vlad came from, but we did know that he wasn’t a garden-variety human being. The origin that Tim Seeley gives him fits perfectly with the Hack/Slash universe and sets-up a whole raft of future story angles. I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of Vlad’s past coming into the pages of Hack/Slash once the ongoing series from gets ramped back up at Image in the next month or so.
All of the things that make Vlad such a great character are on full display here. We get to see how he remains a kind an optimistic character despite the incredible sadness of his life and his protective nature also shines through as he dotes on a young lady who is in trouble. And, of course, there are a few trademark Vlad bits of humor. For example, at one point where his charge says she’ll be his friend, but he has to follow her around all the time, stay out of site and not bother her. She concludes, “That doesn’t sound like too shitty of a deal, does it?” To which Vlad replies, “No! It sounds like a fair amount of shit.” I LOVE those little naive bits from Vlad
Daniel Leister’s art is very effective for this series. He can do gory (as we see on the first page). He can draw attractive women. He can emphasize monstrous nature. But what I think I like best about Leister is that he varies his panels and his layout quite a bit.
What’s Not So Good: My only real complaint with this issue is that it is a one-shot. When I think of the great non-mainstream comics that I love, they start at #1 and keep going. The Walking Dead, Planetary, Promethea, Y the Last Man, Scalped, etc. They all just keep putting one foot in front of the other and it is very simple to know what order to read them in. And while TWD is a linear story, some of those others are anything but. For whatever reason, Tim Seeley likes to put out these one-shots and minis that make devising a reading order a little tricky.
The trouble isn’t so much for us current readers, but for newer fans. Hack/Slash did pretty well with the first released annual sales at Comixology, but I just don’t think that having an on-going series with lots of one-shots and mini-series is very friendly to new readers. When the new reader goes onto Comixology’s app and goes to the “H” section, they will see a long list of Hack/Slash titles and not know what to read first. Elephantmen does this same thing and I just don’t get it.
For this one issue, I’m sure that it is related to the transition of this property from Devil’s Due to Image. But, I wouldn’t make a habit of this in the future.
Not Seeley’s fault, but this issue was about the third I’ve gotten recently from Image that had weird creases in the interior pages. It’s as if the pages ran through the printer slightly crooked and got creased. I just wish Image wouldn’t do this because their products are otherwise pretty professional, printed on nice paper, etc.
Conclusion: Publication and numbering issues aside, this is a very good origin story for a favorite character. I’m sure this origin info will be used when Tim Seeley restarts the Hack/Slash ongoing series at Image in a few weeks.
Grade: B
-Dean Stell
Grade
Conclusion