Everything is coming together in a bad way.
Creative Staff:
Story: Tom Taylor
Art: Trevor Hairsine, Gigi Baldassin
Colors: Rain Beredo
Letterer: Said Temofonte
What They Say:
The remaining heroes of the DC Universe are stuck between Hell and a hard place! With the Justice League racing against the clock to create a cure, the cruel masters of the southern garden are determined to wipe all anti-life from the planet.
Just when you didn’t think it could get worse…the war to save Earth takes a devilish new direction! Trigon is coming to end the world as Hell is long due its payment in souls!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
DCeased continues to be a property that just delivers in spades for me in ways of seeing characters not re-imagined but actually progressing forward and showing how they’d cope and deal with issues. It’s what makes this work so strong and why Tom Taylor is the talent that he is. This installment definitely has some fun with that growth aspect and really makes you wish it was sprawling out further than it did by its end. The series has Trevor Hairsine handling the pencils on it with a great team behind him inking and coloring it so that it shows a real richness in design and layouts and captures both the power of the events and the humanity of it as well, whether dealing with Ollie or the last couple of pages and spreads there.
As we get closer to the end with just one more installment to go, there’s naturally a lot going on here. Almost too much in a way as there are three main tracks that are largely unfolding. And they all lead to this big moment in the final issue as it comes together. Being a fan of the magic side of DC, I really enjoyed seeing how Constantine has figured out the best approach to try and save people as he knows Trigon is coming. He’s hid the plan for so long now but Zatanna’s arrival throws it into chaos yet provides the avenue he needs to draw in those remaining pieces in order to make this happen. Gathering various pieces of magic artifacts to himself and using them in a combined way is likely the only way to really take down Trigon, who shows up in Paris toward the end here and eliminates everyone with the anti-life virus, and it’s pretty grim to see what Constantine has to do to finalize his plan. But I love how Zatanna knows the truth of it by the end.
While that plays out, we also see how Ivo and his gang have set things in motion with the Amazos as they’re now starting to eliminate all the anti-life beings it finds. That’s bad enough in itself because we learn across this issue that through a real meeting of the minds that also includes Batman, the cure has been found and they do get a chance to test it. It’s a good moment in deciding the test case for some solid reasons that make sense and then working through the problem of production in a purely comic-book way that we can all roll our eyes at after the last two years of understanding production and supply chains. But it provides hope at the right but worst moment as those inflicted with the anti-life virus are now being destroyed around the world, just as they’re able to be saved.
In Summary:
As we move quickly toward the finale in the next issue, a lot of things are thrown at the reader here that again makes me wish this was a longer series so that the build-up could have been explored more. But I’m also enjoying the energy of what we’re getting here and how it’s progressing. Everything is moving at a good pace, the scripts are fun, the character interactions continue to be a delight while being filled with emotion, and the artwork is fantastic. This is a larger storyline that works really well and makes for a lot of fun in compiled/full reading as well I’m sure. There’s a lot of things here that make it worth repeated reads and that’s hard to say for a lot of comics these days.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: DC Comics
Release Date: December 1st, 2020
MSRP: $3.99
