“Like a Devil With His Head Cut Off”
Creative Staff:
Story: Brain Buccellato
Art: Hayden Sherman
Letterer: Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou
What They Say:
The most unlikely chicken-fried revenge story continues. Mitchell, our overmatched hero, must contend with the bloody aftermath of his first run-in with the Russian mob…as he deals with nosey detectives, his shady business partner, Antonio, and the stolen heroin.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Chicken Devil is certainly a title that catches attention and I went into the opening installment figuring out what it was pretty quick without doing much in the way of advance lookup on it. I’ve read a bunch of Brian Buccellato’s work over the years, from his Flash days to the run on Injustice, so I was curious to see where he’d go with this original work. The opening installment was more chaotic than I care for but the second issue here manages to smooth things out a bit. Hayden Sherman has wowed me on several titles in the last few years so getting a chance to see more of his kinetic artwork definitely excites me. With this property, it feels like with the story and artwork it’s like Crank meets Falling Down with a chicken mask thrown in for good measure.
With Mitchell having managed to have things go as badly as they have, we pick up with him at Swolls desperately trying to figure out what to do with the body. Lucky for him, most people that work at places like this are oblivious to the world around them so he’s able to put it in a laundry cart and roll it right out to his own truck, which is where he stashes it while missing getting all of the blood up on the outside. The whole experience is, quite honestly, exhausting for him so it’s no surprise that after getting a bite to eat from a drive-thru that he ends up crashing out once he gets the truck back in his own garage at home. That leads to a flashback that just highlights what kind of truly awful family his mother made for him and you’re left wondering just how much damage that’s done to him over the years.
While Mitchell is intent on figuring out his next step, the next day doesn’t go any better for him at all. The mob is starting to tighten its grip in finding their goods but he has to sidestep the detectives first as they’ve come to his home. And the dead guy’s phone keeps going off which is certainly a… distraction. It’s amusing watching him deal with this and then find the absolute worst place to story the body for a while before going to meet Antonio. With his longtime partner revealing himself to be as terrible as he is for a while now, what we see here is that he’s intent on just trying to get a ton of money for the drugs and then disappear and hide out for the rest of his life. And he wants Mitchell to go with him, though Mitch can’t really process this or even think of leaving his life, even with all the bloodshed. Of course, the mob has to have their say too at the end here.
In Summary:
The way events keep taking worse and worse turns in his life pretty much makes it clear how scary this series is going to get as it continues and this issue makes it so much worse. Mitchell’s life is just a complete shitshow here but watching him basically go through it all like a pinball is definitely enjoyable. Buccellato keeps throwing obstacles at him that are amusing to watch surface but a good chunk of the fun is just in seeing how Sherman delivers this visually, from the expressions on their faces and especially just the perspectives we get sometimes and the way the chaos unfolds. It’s definitely a delightfully absurd piece, but it’s also a pretty basic piece of storytelling even with the additional trappings we get here.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 15+
Released By: AfterShock Comics
Release Date: November 10th, 2021
MSRP: $4.99