Exorsisters #5 // Review
Paranormal investigators Kate and Cate only wanted to help. Help isn’t an easy thing to offer when things get complicated....and things ALWAYS get complicated whenever magic is concerned. Their desire to help put them in a peril that brings them in touch with a supernatural force that echoes back into their supernatural origin in the fifth issue of Exorsisters. Writer Ian Boothby’s comic adventure continues with art by Gisèle Lagacé and color by Pete Pantazis. The distinct world of the sisters continues to refreshingly unique while still maintaining a solid grounding in fun, breezy contemporary pop fantasy.
Kate and Cate find themselves pulling out of the darkness that they had slipped into at the end of last issue just long enough to get some sort of an explanation as to what’s going on. As it turns out, the sisters’ latest difficulties have something to do with the first ever shadow. It was something not exactly mention in the Old Testament. When the words “Let there be light,” were spoken, shadow followed. The darkness of that shadow is growing and attempting to bring everything back to the nothingness that existed before light. It’s up to the Exorsisters to confront the menace of The First Shadow.
Boothby does a good job of lowering a few different elements of complexity into the magical world of the sisters. It’s a relief to see that some of the weaker aspects of magical fantasy are being avoided. Boothby’s series steals clear of the lazy, “good versus evil” shorthand in favor of something much more dynamic. The origin of the sisters turns out to be really interesting. Their opposing personalities come from a really clever backstory that shows a lot of promise as the series continues.
This particular issue has a lot of discussion of supernatural with Boothby’s witty dialogue, but the visuals for this issue don’t carry a lot of fantasy about them. Lagacé manages to keep the issue visually interesting with engaging social interaction between the Kate, Cate and the fallen angel. Kate and Cate’s differing reactions to the events of the story are fun to watch as they are essentially two different sides of the same person. The drama inherent in that split identity makes for a casually fun socially engaging visual for the issue even if there isn’t a whole lot going on that’s spectacularly fantastic. Pantazis is given a few moments of dramatic color to render including the glowing eyes and aura of a man evidently possessed by The First Shadow.
Having finally arrived at the origin of Cate and Kate, the central pulse of the series is firmly established in the fifth issue of the series. The central mystery of who the characters is a delicate matter in this type of intrigue-based series. Now the backstory is fully rendered the series get on with the business of reaching what will likely be a satisfying conclusion to this story arc.
