Josie’s back and she’s going to give you trouble…
Creative Staff:
Story: Joelle Jones
Art: Joelle Jones
Colors: Michelle Madsen
Letterer: CRANK!
What They Say:
Josie’s new partnership begins to sour when an over-the-top gift brings trouble for Gene.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Josie is not the kind of woman who likes conflict but when Irving decides to stash the dead body of her husband’s boss in her garage, conflict is exactly what’s on the menu as she brings up wanting to dissolve her partnership with the dangerous “cleaner”/assassin. A calm discussion for Josie, it should be noted, involves gardening shears to the throat. She came there tonight to make pork chops for dinner and she’s honestly feeling pretty out of sorts right now. Also, the pork chops being in the bottom of a freezer containing a dead man would probably tick off most people. Irving leaves to give her time to realize what ending their partnership will really mean.
Meanwhile, Gene is trying to strike up helpful discourse with some airplane mechanic colleagues, but they quickly decide he’s too much of a desk man to provide useful knowledge. He takes it in stride but it’s clear he’s not having a great day either and any hopes of leaving work early are dashed by the arrival of two detectives bent on questioning him over his boss’ disappearance. It’s clear they suspect him, but let him go regardless telling him to stay in town. It’s definitely not looking like a Merry Christmas for the Schullers at the rate things are going, but hey, we finally get to see Gene outside of Josie’s POV!
Later on a kill, things don’t go as planned for Josie when Irving intervenes to “help” Josie and lays his thoughts on the table for her: they’re a lot alike, except that he’s accepted a small, congenial life isn’t for him and that Josie should stop pretending or apologizing for what she really is, a killer, just like him. She slips away from him and the conversation and heads home, making excuses for that bridge ran late when Gene asks what time it is. Here we get a nice little scene of Josie and Gene without the rest of the family or distraction, where he expresses he doesn’t like not knowing where she is or eating leftovers and a lot’s been on his mind at work. Before they can finish their conversation a commotion disrupts them and they find their dog, Duke, very injured by broken glass seemingly from one of their windows being broken. As Gene takes the dog and the kids to the vet, Josie and Mother Schuller are quietly, solemnly resolved to knowing what really happened: Irving.
An interesting theme that seems to permeate Lady Killer from the first series to this sequel series is how it seems that Josie fares much better alone professionally than with partners, as they seems to always either decide to take her out or are too much loose cannons, but it doesn’t seem like she wants to be a total lone wolf either given she strives so much to keep her family and domestic life in balance. I don’t believe, that is until Jones states otherwise in the narrative in future issues, that it’s a life Josie built as a cover because she does seem to genuinely care for her family and husband. But isn’t that the interesting thing in the end with this story; seeing how much longer Josie can dance on the knife’s edge balancing both her lives? She’s a survivor, but with the police looking at Gene, the boss’ body having been in her freezer, and Irving on the loose, will her dual lives finally bleed into each other in ways she can’t keep stitching up?
In Summary:
Another great issue that gets the story quickly moving, and wonderful art from Jones as always. I was wondering why there was a delay between issues, but even with months apart it’s still fairly easy slipping back into this story. It might sound awful, but I am enjoying how Josie’s lives are unravelling more because I actually do want Gene to find out about her, I want that conflict, I want to see how Josie is going to resolve her carefully separated worlds colliding because the tension is just delicious to think about and I hope the story goes in that direction. It makes me wonder if the brief bedroom scene with Gene and Josie might be a sign of the things to come because it seems they are working to start increasing tension in Gene’s character and I like to thing that scene had a purpose beyond just setting up for the dog.
And even if that all doesn’t come to pass, I’m still enjoying the ride to see what happens next, and the cute mid-century fashion looks.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: T+
Released By: Dark Horse Comics
Release Date:March 08, 2017
MSRP: $3.99