"Curse #1" Comic Review
Written by James Ferguson
Published by BOOM! Studios
Written by Michael Moreci and Tim Daniel
Illustrated by Riley Rossmo and Colin Lorimer
2013, 24 Pages, $3.99
Comic released on January 15th, 2013
Review:
A man stands in a dimly lit workshop. He grabs a can of gasoline and begins to pour it around a pale man surrounded by bear traps and held in place by a series of chains. Life wasn't always like this for Laney Griffin, but running into a werewolf can have a strange effect on you. This is how Curse opens up and while it fills me with questions, I can't help but want to learn more.
Curse starts off with a look at the present and then jumps into the past to show you how Griffin came to be standing in that workshop. Since an injury ended his football career, he's been struggling. His wife is dead and his son is suffering from cancer. Griffin wants to do what's best for his child but he doesn't have the cash to do it. Meanwhile, something has been terrorizing the local forest. Something big. It's left a bloody trail of gore behind it and bodies are piling up. The county has offered a reward to whoever can bring in this beast. You can see where this is going.
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While this first issue doesn't connect all of the dots between the opening scene and his journey into the woods, it sets the stage for the series. You instantly side with Griffin and want him to finally catch a break in life. He seems like a standup guy, but could his son's disease lead him to torture? If his actions could lead to an improvement in his son's health, does that justify them? It's a moral dilemma and I don't even have all the facts. It's like I'm Fox News.
Riley Rossmo and Colin Lorimer share art duties for Curse. Their styles are different, but they blend well within this issue. Rossmo tends to be frenetic, like objects that were moving when a photograph was taken. Meanwhile, Lorimer is more clean cut. It makes sense then that the former handled the scenes dealing with the monster in the woods while the latter handled Griffin's sections. It's a good balance between the two. Each artist is helping to set the tone of the story.
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Curse is off to a great start. This is the kind of origin issue you want from a new story. There's just enough information to make it worth your $4, with enough questions to make you want to come back for more. The shots of the werewolf are sparse, but the scares come from the fact that that Griffin is taking the first steps down a dark path and he doesn't even realize it.
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