Advance Review — ‘Dead By Daylight: The Hillbilly’ #2 Needs More Hillbilly 

For a story that is supposed to give readers and gamers the origin story of a particularly nasty baddie, Dead By Daylight: The Hillbilly #2 could use a lot more of…well, the Hillbilly.

It’s not that the story presented in the limited series isn’t interesting, but it just doesn’t seem overly relevant. We’re now halfway through the series, and we’ve barely seen Max Thompson Jr. In fact, the only reason we even know his real name is because of the game the comic series is based on. 

Instead, writer Derek Fridolfs gives us a story of police corruption in a small town. In the last issue, Officer Hollis took down a big-time drug dealer singlehandedly, earning everyone’s attention. But that attention seems to be a double-edged sword now. His boss and some of their gool ol boys in the department took Hollis out to a farm where Hillbilly lives and stranded the hero cop there as a hazing ritual.

Now Hollis is ticked and causing trouble. That causes the chief to threaten his officer. The situation is even more charged given that Hollis is Black while the chief and his cronies are White.  

Again, it’s not a bad story, but it doesn’t inform us much about Hillbilly, which is presumably why most readers would want to pick up the book in the first place. Fridolfs will probably give them more of what they are looking for in the final two issues, but it’s unclear if the audience will stick around.

In the meantime, readers can get an eyeful from Dean Kotz’ artwork. While the story demands visuals of small-town police shenanigans, Kotz depicts a particularly gruesome scene where Hillbilly slaughters cows with a sledgehammer. It’s enough to make Hollis vomit. 

The clock is ticking for Officer Hollis as well as this creative team. It’s time to put the Hillbilly front and center.

Dead By Daylight: The Hillbilly #2 — written by Derek Fridolfs, illustrated by Dean Kotz, colored by Allison Hu, and lettered by AndWorld Design — will be available Wednesday in comic book stores and on digital platforms from Titan Comics.