Coffin Hill #1 - Comic Review

The major comic companies put out enough comics that sometimes it can leave your head spinning and eyes bleeding as you search the new titles each week for something worth reading. To aid in your Geeky endeavors, Speak Geeky To Me on occasion reviews new titles from the major companies to spotlight the best and worst of what’s available at your local comic shop. So sit back, relax, and enjoy a new Comic Review.

The Info Bit

Title: Coffin Hill #1

Genre/s: Horror/Drama

Writer: Caitlin Kitterdge (Night Life, The Iron Thorn)

Artist: Inaki Miranda (2000AD, Fairest)

Colorist: Eva De La Cruz (2000AD, Fairest)

Letterer: Travis Lanham (Swamp Thing, Teen Titans)

Publisher: Vertigo

Number of Issues: 1 (on-going)

Page Count: 24

Price: $2.99

The Review Bit

Eve Coffin a rookie police officer in present day Massachusetts has just made a career collar by arresting a serial killer known as The Ice Fisher. But at her post arrest celebration at the bar she finds herself in no mood to party, instead returning home. Unfortunately at home she finds a friend being held at gunpoint by a familiar drug dealer. As Eve tries to talk him down a small scuffle ensues and Eve is shot. While being rushed into surgery for the wound she flashes back 10 years to a party at Coffin House, her family estate. It seems Eve is part of New English royalty, one could say, in the sense of old money, older blood, and old secrets to boot. It is near Halloween and Eve’s parents are throwing a swanky Black & White ball. But Eve finds herself dressing in a gothic-punk style outfit and crashing the party with insults and teenage angst before bailing to hang out with friends and a bottle of booze. But she doesn’t leave the house without stealing a special book, which her and her friends use to enact some dark and witch like ritual. They cut their hands to shed blood for the ritual right before the scene shifts to the next morning…where they awake naked, surrounded by dead animals, and soaked in blood.

From here the comic seems to find an even darker tone, as we return to 2013. Some of Eve’s friends are still in Coffin Hill, the town in which Eve’s family estate exists. They’re trudging through the forest with a large search party, attempting to find two lost people. Meanwhile, Eve gets out of the hospital from her gunshot wound, her face scarred and eye changed. For reasons not fully shared yet, she is now without a job and the press are all over her. She comes to the belief she only has one option left.

Coffin Hill is a very interesting comic based on its first issue alone. It pulls you in with beautiful artwork and dark tones that seem befitting of Vertigo, then leaves you with all the right questions that have you anxiously awaiting the second issue. Kitterdge is a veteran author, despite her youth, and her talent and voice are definitely felt in the script and dialogue of Coffin Hill. Eve Coffin has the feel of an angry and rebellious young girl with problems-a-plenty. You can really sense angst and emotion in the dialogue, yet the setting itself is enough to draw readers in.

For art, you don’t get much more beautiful than what Miranda and De La Cruz put together. The figures are all young, beautifully rendered, and sexy with incredible color and tone. The various outfit designs all look unique and youthful, giving personality to the characters that wear them as much as the tattoos designed on them, unique and rebellious hair styles, and vast array of facial expressions. Miranda definitely draws his figures very sexy and beautiful, with no real detracting appearances yet having shown up, so you get a sort of Hollywood horror tone. But it is hard to complain with this kind of story, as that beautiful look to the art is yet another draw to the title. Meanwhile, De La Cruz compliments this all with very soft and moody tones of color contrasted by moments of bright color in hair and make-up. Altogether it just looks incredible. On lettering, Travis Lanham keeps up the quality you find in all of his DC comics, and presents some great design for his captions that define time and location in the book. Going for wide bars across the panels, his captions really stand out and sync up wonderfully with Miranda’s usage of thick gutters between his panels.

The opening issue runs 24-pages for just $2.99, longer than your average three dollar DC book. Never-the-less, I hate that we’re at the point where a comic can tease “Extra-sized issue” on the cover and be just 24-pages long. I’m pretty sure that used to be standard size, but I suppose that is what the industry is quickly becoming. Still, it is a great read and worth picking up.

The Rating Bit

Coffin Hill reminds me of the quality Vertigo was once known for and retains on occasion to this day. This well written and beautifully drawn book is up there with the recent works of Vaughn and Willingham at Vertigo, or more so the older Vertigo titles from Ennis, Ellis, Delano, and Loeb. It is a great package of sequential art with high potential to be something amazing. I easily give the book a 9 out of 10 and will go a step further to predict this being a bit of a sleeper hit people will be talking about down the line.