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Spoiler Alert
Who needs an American Werewolf in London when there’s an Afro-American one in the mean streets of Los Angeles. Janie “Strummer” Jones is a P.I. on the hunt for the assassin out to kill her kind in the comic titled Black’s Myth. She took one for the team, and thankfully survived. However, she has yet to identify the killer. Ben Si’lat is her assistant and a djinn to boot! He can’t grant wishes, but can help her out in other ways that she can’t. She can only do so much when in lupine form to use her enhanced senses.
This noir-style horror comic book from writer Eric Palicki and artist Wendell Cavalcanti has a lot to like. Presenting this world in B&W gives this world character. Plus, the blood splatters look better when painted in plain ol’ black.
The style also works to give the supernatural a look that’s often missing in the colour world. It’s tough to spot a face in the night–that’s unless you see the whites of their eyes. Most animals have a reflective layer to make theirs seem like they’re glowing red or orange, but that’s only because the victim is shining a flashlight upon them! We get that sense of foreboding in Cavalcanti’s work. She’s also given the classic werewolf look a new style which I haven’t seen before.
This world isn’t any different from the classic World of Darkness scheme in the RPG world. In the first issue alone, I get the sense there’s also demons, vampires and other spooks hiding ’round the corner. We just may see them featured in upcoming issues.
In how this series caught my interest is in the small bits of dialogue saying these lycans don’t have much control have when certain times of the year take place–namely, St Lucia’s Day, The Pentecost and Midsummer. This bit of dialogue sets up a lot of potential for Black Myth to go far. It’s not just because our protagonist is an African-American with a good heart. The setup for future story arcs is very promising and perhaps even Hellboyish. Janie has to travel to Hell and battle the devil to stop him from stealing the harvest! Now that’s a story I’d love to see developed.
The tale that’s introduced needs issue #2 for me to claw into. I‘m sure Janie’s going to need a (magical) gun if she’s to handle the mean streets of L.A. She can’t transform into wolf mode to deal with those threats hiding in public view, so other options are going to be required.