The God Con

Hellblazer #16 (DC, January 2018, $3.99)
I haven't read Hellblazer for awhile. I'm not sure I like the mainstreaming of the Vertigo books into the DC universe proper, and I'm particularly not sure that John Constantine is easily pigeonholed with the Swamp Thing and Phantom Stranger like the publisher did with Justice League Dark or even Forever Evil: Blight.



But Richard Kadrey—Richard f*ck*ng Kadrey—as writer is enough to bring me back in. Because if anyone can save Constantine (and after that movie, he needs saving), it's Kadrey. The author of wonderful books such as Metrophage (read it, already), excellent comics such as Accelerate (drawn by the Pander Brothers, naturally, because who else can draw Kadrey?), and author of the more recent and relatively popular series of Sandman Slim novels, Kadrey's pen is mighty.

Dude, what did you do to me? This comic sucks. I'm glad that you wrote #17, too, so I can see if things improve—and so you already drew check—but oh, my goodness. It's like an Amanda Palmer fan wrote an issue of Testament after watching Preacher. Seriously.

Davide Fabbri and Joe Marzan, Jr., could be drawing anything. "I never pictured you for the god con." Profanities are dingbatted. P. 6 goes five panel, which suggests some page design consideration. But otherwise, it's like a Dresden Files novel until the Halloween Demon shows up.

Kad, you pushed all the buttons. Why didn't you rip open the machine?

Availability: You can buy this issue online.  But the best thing you can do is read Metrophage.