Shadecraft #1 // Review
There's something about the shadows. There's something about the darkness that collects behind those places where the light hits. There's something poetically compelling about it. Writer Joe Henderson explores a bit of this poetry with the first issue of the new Image Comics series Shadecraft. Henderson brings the whole team from Image's Skyward series along for the ride, including artist Lee Garbett and colorist Antonio Fabela. The series's opening issue tells the story of a high school girl named Zadie Lu, who has an embarrassing moment complicated by apparently homicidal shadows in the evening. Zadie's story shows some potential in an interesting opening issue.
Zadie is walking home with Josh on a breezy night in autumn in Joliet, Illinois. She mistakes something he says for something he doesn't mean, and she's rushing off into the night alone. That's when the shadows come. At first, they're only twisting around strangely on the ground behind her…then they pounce. Shadows aren't supposed to do that. Now Zadie is dealing with the embarrassment of a confused kiss AND the possibility that the shadows might be coming to get her. All while dealing with the ongoing stresses of being the sister of a guy who has been in a coma for far too long.
The "lone high school girl dealing with the supernatural" sub-genre of horror fiction can be a lot of fun. Henderson's got a solid handle on the right wit to deliver a very thoughtfully engaging hero with Zadie. Still, there isn't a whole lot in her journey that feels unique enough to be memorable in and of itself. She's a really cool girl and fun to hang out with for 30 pages or so, but the story she's in doesn't seem to hold a whole lot of interest on its own. Thankfully, it doesn't have to.
Garbett gives Zadie a charming visual appeal. Her wild, short black hair, orange jacket, and messenger bag give her an appealing visual signature. Garbett's got a very sharp sense of nuance in the emotions written across her face. She holds herself with a guarded sense of confidence that Garbett brings vividly to the page. The real appeal of the book is its use of light. The entire horror of the book lies in the interplay between light and shadow. Fabela brings that interplay to the page with striking clarity. This is absolutely essential, and Fabela nails it. This is a story about homicidal shadows…the shadows are either going to look really, really silly, or breathtakingly sinister. There's really no space in between. Fabela vividly conjures the shadows to the page.
Henderson and Garbett's Skyward ran for a solid 15 issues before it came to a close back in 2019. With the first issue of Shadecraft, artist and writer have crafted an opening issue with the right pacing and visual appeal to have an equally satisfying run. Zadie is relatable enough as a character that it's easy to imagine hanging out with her and her shadows for the next year-and-a-half or so.
