By Zack Quaintance — Write It In Blood is a four-issue miniseries released entirely online in April and May, during a time when new physical comics releases were mostly stalled out. From the creative team of writer Rory McConville, artist Joe Palmer, colorist Chris O’Halloran (Ice Cream Man!), and letterer Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou, the book was available via Gumroad, at a price point of $2 minimum, with the option to pay more. The first issue hit in late April, and the finale is available now.

As the preview text for Write It In Blood #1 suggests, this comic is a crime noir set in rural Texas, and for those who skipped that preview text, it goes right ahead and makes this known with an austere-yet-very-effective first page. This story opens with three panels: establishing shot of rural Texas farmhouse (complete with tractor), two dudes murdered, and then a close up on a third with off-panel dialogue asking, “Do you think he’s going to get us a retirement present?” You can see the page below.

I decided to open this review with a close focus on this page because really, it’s all in there. The page lays out the story’s central subject matter like the first sentence in a great novel, and it also serves as a statement of purpose: this is going to be violent, harsh, right to the point, and incredibly confident. It gives us a sense of this story’s tone and framework, before the rest of the scene fills in details and provides a quick glimpse at McConville and Palmer’s keen sense of humor, tragicomic and dark as it is. That sense of humor is one of the most acute strengths of Write It In Blood, played out often through the excellent scripting.

The action in the foreground has to do with two hitmen physically going about and doing hitmen things. At the same time, however, they spend so much of this book mentally engaged with mundanity raiders will surely relate to — one character is having a messy love affair, another dealing with last-minute snags in purchasing his dream house, a random heavy wants to simplify life by going back to flip phones, etc. Playing out these kind of relatable human dramas on larger-than-life genre canvases is something comics has done better than any other medium of late, and Write It In Blood is another great example of it. I personally can’t get enough of seeing my problems conveyed via storylines with hitmen, or superheroes, or space pirates, and I greatly enjoyed McConville’s sensibilities and keen wit all throughout this one. There’s more than a bit of Stray Bullets (my all-time favorite crime comic, from the great David and Maria Lapham) to this one, and I mean that as the highest possible compliment.

Palmer’s artwork also does a great job throughout of working in tandem with the dialogue, building in reaction shots and pauses to emphasize the beats. Palmer also has a knack for illustrating the empty and consuming vastness of the scenery in rural Texas, be it a sun-soaked farmhouse exterior or a sky filled with stars at night. Palmer is also a great choice for illustrating a violent story about hitmen, capable in equal parts of creating splash panels that illustrate kills in which heads are blown off as well as close-combat, including a sequence in the first issue brought to life by close shots of a progressively-bloodied fist to illustrate a pummeling.

O’Halloran does an excellent job of complimenting the artwork with his colors. O’Halloran is one of my favorite colorists, and I’ve written at length about his work on Image Comics’ modern classic horror anthology series, Ice Cream Man. As strange as it is to type this, the artwork in that book is a bit more realistic, even as it depicts things like massive spiders or eternal ancient evils. It just has a slightly less cartoony bent. In this book, O’Hallaron is able to do a lot with entire panel shades, using them excellently to convey kinetic action, as he does to perfect in the sequence below. Check it out, it’s really great stuff, with that whole middle panel lighting up at the point of contact before a return to the previous shading brings us back to the rural gloaming:

This next page (which we’ll get to in a second) is another great example of the way O’Hallaron uses his colors to emphasize violence throughout, and it’s also a great example of how great Otsmane-Elhaou’s lettering is in this comic. Otsmane-Elhaou is an expert and fearless letterer, never distracting from what’s happening in the story while taking bold risks that pay off in the way they emphasize the action. The dialouge on this page (as well as the CRACK sfx) are just perfect, managing to convey multiple pitches of shouting in a way that’s not often seen in comics. Check it out:

While I most appreciated the small clever moments within Write It In Blood, the larger plotting is well-done too. There’s a character who serves as a perfect and very funny MacGuffin, there’s protagonists on the run from multiple threats, there’s high action, there’s secrets and surprising twists. It’s all great, a nice framework to play out the character building and fun dialogue within. It’s a compulsively readable comic, ideal for the weekly format it was released in because it’s the type of fast-paced story that benefits from a shorter wait between installments. I read it all at once after it was completed (my preferred method of consuming these types of stories, be it a comic book miniseries or a season of TV), and I blew through it all this morning, so quickly that I had time to sit down and get out this review that I had initially planned to write later in the week. And I think that speaks for itself as another ringing endorsement of a great comic.

Overall: Write It In Blood is an expertly-crafted and relentlessly-crafted crime comic. It’s suspenseful and exciting, with core themes about romance and recklessness and work. I highly recommend checking it out. 9.5/10

Write It In Blood #1 - #4
Writer: Rory McConville
Artist: Joe Palmer
Colorist: Chris O’Halloran
Letterer: Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou
Logo Design: Martha Hegarty
Design: Declan Shalvey
Price: $2+ per issue, or $8+ for the whole thing.
On the eve of their retirement, two hitmen, Cosmo and Arthur Pryce drive through the Texas countryside with a hostage, the infamous Little Harkness, in the trunk of their car. The brothers are meant to deliver Harkness to their boss, but matters become complicated when Arthur’s recklessness jeopardises Cosmo’s retirement plans and puts a target on their backs.
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Zack Quaintance is a tech reporter by day and freelance writer by night/weekend. He Tweets compulsively about storytelling and comics as Comics Bookcase.