Comic Review: Wicked Things SC (BOOM! Studios)

BOOM! Studios release another adventure of a young detective who would sooner or later have dire consequences in Wicked Things, the graphic novel.

I never believe how many comics that I’ve collected which is about homicide cases and detective work, but unlike Batman and Death Note, we get to focus on a female main character who is a detective in her teenage age, which is a total klutz for touching a dead body covered with blood. The comic is written by John Allison and illustrated by Max Sarin. John is a comic writer and artist who has been producing comics since 1998 and his work has won multiple Eisner Awards, mostly in webcomics which is notable for beginner webcomic creators out there. And Max is a Finnish cartoonist who is best known to draw Giant Days with John and published in this company. But the question is, how special is this comic which is more of a webcomic material?

The front cover shows a dramatic scene of the main character is standing while holding an award of Teen Detective of the Year, and when I look at it, the transparent block almost looks like it’s alive because it’s wearing a hat and has a mouth while it’s smoking a pipe, what crack that these people are smoking? And apparently, the background takes place in some checkup for the criminals who can measure their height, you know that place in the police department. And there is a quote that is written by Multiversity Comics as “In a fair and just world, we would always get comics by Allison, Sarin, and company. In a wicked and depraved one, we’d get them too.” To be honest, I don’t know them, but this is the first time that I get this book which is written by a webcomic artist and the artist who draws like Gurihiru. But seriously, it would be amazing if Gurihiru actually illustrated the whole cover art and comics at the same time, that would make my day better, but instead, I get her cover art right at the end of the book.

The story starts with a young girl named Charlotte Grote who has a bright future to become a detective, then she found out about a contest of some other teenage detectives to receive an award right from a magazine, and the strange part is that it mentioned her name which is very random. Anyway, she met some younger detectives at her age from different countries and somehow she seems to be displeased because they were rude. Everything is well, but right until Charlotte finds a Japanese detective who is collapsed and found out that he was stabbed and bleeds badly, and then she became such a moron for touching a dead guy’s blood which actually framed her instantly without knowing. Since that whole incident, she is put under surveillance just until she sorted out that she stabbed him or find someone who did all this, which almost takes you to another Drake and Josh episode setting of a story. Then they expect to have her work in the police department treating her like an intern worker giving them some cups of coffee and stuff. I’m sorry to say this, but this comic is very dumb. I don’t know what’s there about the story that gives out a good comedy, but the people in this comic are very rude to Charlotte because she doesn’t know what it looked like to be an adult with responsibilities as someone who calls herself a detective who touched some guy’s blood and took the blame on her. That is until one of the detectives wanted to take down some person who in some gang and it was some thug-looking person with some bandages in his right hand who hides his gun in there. And then after that, her friend tried to find out who stabbed that guy and she was actually dumber than her because she can’t solve a riddle inside a paradox, as she said. But when he woke up, he told his lover that Charlotte is innocent and asked her to avenge him and said “there are two of them.” Is it me or is this whole thing make any sense to readers because this comic is really dumb.

The story is confusing and dumb as it gets because the reason that the story became a mystery is that we don’t even know who the heck stabbed the Japanese detective which Charlotte found collapsed while he’s bleeding so badly. This whole storytelling isn’t about solving a case, it’s about having a college student working the police force as an intern in a nutshell. Was this comic supposed to be developed by human beings, is it for kids? I feel like I’m reading another newbie’s graphic novel. I COULDN’T EVEN IMAGINE WHAT THEY WERE THINKING ABOUT WRITING THIS STORY. So anyway, the art is more cartoony, it should belong to Webtoon because what I can see through the whole comic, the expressions of characters faces are very goofy and funny in a way that this whole series should be a webcomic instead of Boom! Studios. I don’t know why, but it’s a hunch that I have after I witnessed the artist’s art style. The one thing I do like about this comic is that even if this is supposedly has a strong sense of female protagonists, the characters are lovable and funny at the same time, but anyway, this should be a character expression study for readers out there. And with that, we have the last nice thing, I will ever say about this comic.