Advance Review: Sloppy Visuals Shatter The Illusion Of ‘Malevolent’ #2
by Tom Smithyman
Ultimately, art is about escapism — transporting us somewhere we are not to inform, persuade, or influence us.
But there are times across every art form where things don’t go as planned, and our illusion is shattered. It may be a flat performance by a movie star, a theater actor dropping a line and breaking character onstage, or a part of a painting that doesn’t ring true.
It happens in comic books as well. A bit of dialogue is clunky, or a panel is not well drawn. The illusion is broken and readers are jolted out of the moment. Whether they return or not remains up in the air.
At the risk of overstating the impact of such dramatis interruptus, there’s a panel about halfway through Malevolent #2, which is so poorly drawn by John Bivens, that it has the potential to knock the reader right out of the issue. It’s a long, thin panel that shows a couple of cops preparing for an incursion by the evil Malevolents that are invading our world. But instead of detailing the officer, they look as if they are rough sketches — like Bivens didn’t have time to go back and finish his page layout. (Comicon.com does not have permission to show any inside pages from this issue.)
It’s a shame because Bivens is not a bad artist. While he is not the most detailed illustrator, several pages in this chapter are great, where is shows the transformation of the monster from a human to a mystical monster. But this offending panel forced me to go back and give closer scrutiny to his other pages — some of which also in pretty poor shape.
The issues with the visuals overshadow Justin Jordan’s script. The Mal hunters are still getting used to their newest team member – a human/Mal hybrid that no one trusts. And this new baddie seems to have the upper hand on the hybrid Morgan.
Drawing the interiors for a monthly comic book is a grind. It’s a talent that few of us possess and takes considerable time to get tell a story well. Sometimes that means cutting corners. But in this case, it feels egregious and a insult to the audience.
Malevolent #2 will be available in comic book stores and on digital platforms Wednesday from Image Comics.
Overview
Sometimes, all it takes is a single panel to make a break an issue. Unfortunately in this case, a poorly rendered passage shatters the storytelling illusion for readers. It’s a difficult obstacle to overcome, and the issue never really recovers from it.
