(BOOM! Studios, 2014)

Written by Michael Moreci and Tim Daniel
Art by Riley Rossmo and Colin Lorimer
Additional Colors by Tamra Bonvillian
Letters by Jim Campbell

Who doesn’t love a werewolf story? Watching people walk through the darkened woods away from their broken down car (get back to the car!), or seeing their wide eyes as their heads whip around at the sound of an unearthly howl (get back to the car!) or seeing the “wolf’s view” as it gets closer and closer on their puffy Land’s End down jacket…(you should have stayed in the car!) I’ve been hooked since the epic transformation scene in An American Werewolf in London. And now I’m hooked again, because Michael Moreci and Tim Daniel are writing a werewolf book for Boom! Studios.

The werewolf story is episodic in its very nature, dependent on the cycles of the moon for the change, and it’s a perfect way to transition into a monthly book. There is a certain formula to the werewolf story. An infected person, usually in wolf form, bites or scratches one of the non-infected thereby transmitting the virus and creating another wolf, and the rest of the story is committed to either capturing the new wolf and/or killing the original. So what’s the difference? Why buy this new werewolf book over something else?

Well, Michael Moreci (Hoaxhunters, Prime-8’s, Skybreaker, any number of other cool books on the market now) and Tim Daniel (Strange Nation, Bedlam, Anti-Hero). If you’ve read any of their work you know that these two are crazy good at shaping story and involving and evolving characters. Add into that that they are both obviously fans of the genre which comes through in the way they’ve crafted the plot and characters.

The main character is Laney Griffin, a former football star living in his hometown. His wife is dead; his son has some kind of terminal illness. He is a desperate man, willing to hunt for a killer who is savaging his/her victims in ways that would make any sane person question the wisdom of these kinds of actions. And his sister-in-law wants custody of his son, and doesn’t seem to entirely trust his story regarding her sisters’ death…and then he catches a damn werewolf.

The art for this is perfect, dark and broody for Laney’s scenes, the ones with the werewolf full of slashy movement. They do a kind of Sin City thing with the colors during the wolf scenes, mostly black and white and grey tones with splashes of red for the gore and such which is just as effective and startling on the page now as it was then. Riley Rossomo (Cowboy Ninja Viking, Proof) and Colin Lorimer (Harvest, Dark Horse Presents) have a good feel for the genre and provide the stark pencils and inks that make these pages seem as creepy and full of tension as the writers are pushing for.

Curse #2 comes out on Wednesday, and it provides some back-story that was lacking in the first issue, as well as giving us a better feel for the characters and the way they interact with each other. I’ve read several of Moreci’s books and it seems like he and his artists have the kind of report you dream about when working on a book.

Wednesday is the day comic fans. If you’re waiting for #2 then it’s here, and if you haven’t read it yet now is the time. Curse is a fast-paced, slash-your-guts-out-with-blackened-claws, howl at the moon kind of read, and who doesn’t love a werewolf story?

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Brad Gischia is a writer and artist living in the frozen Upper Peninsula of Michigan. He is married and has three kids and a dog, who all put up with his incessant prattling about comic books.