Coffin Bound #6 // Review
There's a guy boxing in the rain. He says he's boxing the rain. Don't laugh: the rain is fading out, and he's still there. It's just one of a series of overlapping metaphors that restlessly haunt the pages and panels of the sixth issue of Coffin Bound. The beautifully brutal poetry of writer Dan Watters' story asserts itself on the page with a jagged atmosphere showering out of Dani's artwork. Colorist Brad Simpson exhales a bit of the third dimension into every panel. There's a woman who knows God through the prick of a needle. She's looking for a vulture in another trudge through earthbound poetry in a world that's not quite dead.
Taqa has offered a reward for her own death. She's looking for a supernatural vulture, and she figures that this is the best way to draw its attention. So okay: it's a noble strategy, but it's a little crazy, so a concerned friend is looking for the services of a boxer who might serve as a bodyguard. Things aren't going to be easy, though. Taqua has brought a great deal of attention to herself. A mysterious figure named Madame Entropy has emerged. Things are going to get worse for Taqa before they have a chance to get better.
Watters soaks the page with metaphor. It's a heavy, heavy rain. It's also darkly playful. There's a search for God and a search for death. Truth itself seems to be bludgeoning the page as a junky hero quests for an end that might be her own. The feeling of danger isn't quite there, though. It doesn't resonate the way that it could. When the hero of a story is looking for death, the very concept of health and wellbeing are thrown out the window. It's hard to tell what to care about as everyone seems to be lost and in search of something. It's a restless story pleasantly looking for its own pulse.
Dani lets the rain fall in heavy shadow this issue. Everything seems to rest at an interesting skew. Taqa's soulfully tousled moroseness is a sharp contrast against the starkness of her caring friend Doll's beauty. Uneasy passion dangles from odd angles. A window is open to gravity and falling rain and other things at issue's end. There's a potent impact in it all, but it feels like frazzled energy. Thankfully the energy that Dani's working with here has a dark dazzle to it. Dani's work matches Watters' script quite well. It would be difficult to see his work brought to the page by another pair of hands. Simpson's colors fill the rainy shadow with a visceral earthiness.
The lack of driving direction only serves to amplify the directionless jitter of the story's pacing. Anxiety seems to seep in around the edges of every panel. It's not easy to see where the story is going, but all of the conflict's fundamental elements are clearly there. It's just too bad that the story isn't more motivated to move through the panels of an issue like Coffin Bound's sixth.
