Ghost #1
Publisher: Dark Horse
Writer: Kelly Sue DeConnick & Chris Sebela
Artist: Ryan Sook
Colors: Dave McCaig
Letters: Richard Starkings
Since the return of the character Ghost earlier this year, I’ve been anxiously awaiting this ongoing series. I never read the original run back when it first came out, but with this new run making it easy to jump in and coming from a creative team I really liked, I figured it was in my wheelhouse. The mini-series was a real treat into a world of ghosts and demons in the modern day world. It was my kind of book, so how does the first issue of the ongoing hold up to all that? Let’s find out.
The story has us joining Team Ghost several months from the mini-series’ end, and with several demons already handled. Elisa is still struggling to figure out what is going on with all this occult chicanery and to stop all these demons from killing people. The police are dealing with a particularly nasty serial killer, and the city is all wondering if this Ghost is real or not. There’s one demon Elisa meets who may have some promising information, but the cost may be too high.
So without spoiling anything I’ll just say that this issue definitely has me hooked in to want to read more. I went and read it twice, once with the words and once with just the art, it works very well either way. The art conveys the key elements of the story and the words really seal it in. The demons Sook comes up with all have a variety of looks, yet still feel like they come from the same place, and that is often one of my favorite things to see and difficult for many to present well.
DeConnick and Sebela are writing up all sorts of mysteries for this series and giving us a world of danger and monsters, not all of which are demons. They’re making a world I want to learn more about, but also giving me characters I want to learn more about. I really want Elisa to be happy, but I doubt that’s going to be happening any time soon, if ever.
It may be the holiday season that doesn’t often have ghosts in things unless they are taking you through time and space, but I’m glad that Ghost is back for my favorite time of year. It means that we get to read more adventures next year, and hopefully for a while more. I’m all for learning more about these people and the world they inhabit, so let’s dig in for some more Ghost stories, shall we?
Dr. Alexander Bustos
drbustos@comicattack.net
