She Said Destroy #2 Review

Words: Joe Corallo/ Art: Liana Kangas/ Colors: Rebecca Nalty/Letters: Melanie Ujimori/ Vault Comics Vault Comics has conjured up a new original series by a unique creative team with a narrative centering women about in the last pages of issue one went from zero to one hundred. She Said Destroy #1 introduced a world that once had thousands of Gods that folks were able to worship freely until one got greedy and started making a list and taking them out. The last God and her followers to make their stand is the The Morrigan, Goddess of Death and her worshipers are the witches of Fey and they’ve been prepping for a showdown. Traitorous Sun God Brigid is deliciously evil as her cruelties show on page in the fine art and also in her prose-like words from extinguishing a life in front of our eyes to correctly giving out orders to a death squad. She is quickly becoming my favorite and having having her own spaceship with her likeness attached, impressively named, The Inspiration only adds to my adoration. Aesthetic-wise I do really like the different ways Brigid materializes from the psychical full bodied version to the wispy, one dimensional ‘screen’ version of her that is projected. Shout out to the creative team of Kangas, Nalty and Ujimori in the departments of art, coloring and lettering, respectively. They are doing the heavy lifting here, fleshing out the look of this book which includes really well executed action sequences that look fab with well placed paneling, brightly colored pages and special effects from everything from spells to audio from space ship tech. Even though Kangas’ art style isn’t super detailed, her lines work well enough for the art to be consistent and easy on the eyes. It’s a dream team when its complimented by Nalty and Ujimori’s work–one example of this from this issue would be a spell that cast an unlucky person on fire–it is a vivid scene that is as much as eye candy and as what should be considered as textbook example of how to play up tension in a single page of comics regarding storytelling. As the writing was the weakest part of the first issue, I am starting to feel more immersed with this narrative while also having a better idea of the motivations of the bigger players. A flashback between younger Morgana and Brigid adds to the history and mythos of godhood and relevancy in regards to time that was a bright spot in this issue. Corallo has my attention with this tidbit and my curiosity to where this story is going–it appears that young Wiona, best friends with Raul seems to be the chosen one to channel their chosen God and she’s starting to exhibit qualities that start to set her apart from others.  Raul, seems to be more battle ready or eager to be in order to help protect their home and people and they, too add to the energy for the battle. I also acknowledge and dig the deliberate choice for choosing they/they’re pronouns for some of the (named) Witches of Fey–not sure if it is to reflect that some of them are non-binary or trans or that in this world there is a norm for gender-fluidness yet either way, I’m game. This issue ends on a less glamorous note yet it does explicitly imply that the battle is only beginning. Another solid issue where just about everything lines up right: the writing, the art, the coloring, the lettering and the intrigue to read more, She Said Destroy shows promise in a bubblegum-colored, prism-reflecting light. Side note: It’s really cool to see Vault focus on the backpages–the backpages and back matter of floppies has always been a great place for interacting with fans, recognizing comic book stores and, simply put, a thoughtful place to advertise and show what’s next for the publishing company. May this be a practice that continues! Cheers!

8.5 Blue Finger-nailed Cast Spells Out Of 10

See our review for Issue #1 of She Said Destroy here. See reviews of our site’s other Vault Comics here. Want to get Black Nerd Problems updates sent directly to you? Sign up here! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram!