Plunge 2 (featured image) Reviews 

“Plunge” #2

By | March 20th, 2020
Posted in Reviews | % Comments

With well rounded and compelling, realistic characters and cinematic art that complements the eerie plot, comics curator and writer Joe Hill leads by example, delivering what may be the best book yet in his Hill House lineup. (Warning: may contain minor spoilers.)

Cover by Jeremy Wilson

Written by Joe Hill
Illustrated by Stuart Immonen
Colored by Dave Stewart
Lettered by Deron Bennett

After discovering a corpse upon the Sinnikik Atoll, Moriah Lamb leads a team to hunt for other castaways, while Gage Carpenter begins the exploration of the ghost ship Derleth. But there’s something down there in the icy darkness of the Arctic sea, something that doesn’t want to be found. And it isn’t any safer on land. There are things waiting for the search party in the mountain caves, things that were once human…and aren’t quite anymore.

At the end of “Plunge” #1, in the midst of drinking beer and talking crap around the campfire late into the night, British marine biologist Moriah Lamb wandered off to the woods to pee. Moments later, she made a grisly discovery: a pale, sickly corpse with his throat gashed wide open. Weirdly, the wound was crawling with creepy-ass worms even though the deceased still held the knife in his hand, drops of blood suspended from the shiny blade as though time had stopped. Even more unsettling, a voice from somewhere said, “It’s all right if you need to scream, Moriah.”

It was a satisfying end to a rock-solid debut, punctuated by a kickass cliffhanger, the kind that poses great questions and demands you come back for answers. Even so, how many times have you read a brilliant #1 only to be disappointed once you get your hands on the hotly anticipated second issue…? Past performance, as they say, is no guarantee of future results.

Thankfully, “Plunge” #2 not only maintains the first book’s momentum, it escalates the narrative tension and deepens the mystery. Not coincidentally, writer Joe Hill did a ton of heavy lifting in the first issue, fully fleshing out his ensemble and giving us reasons to care. Here, in the second issue, Hill’s investment clearly pays off, imbuing the script with uncommon sophistication, wry humor and wit.

Delivering great characterization while driving the story forward is rarely an easy task. With a cast of six characters, it would seem to be damn near impossible. Hill pulls it off, however, allowing him to accelerate his already compelling plot, while making it more nuanced and richer in the process. It also gives the book a simple, intuitive structure that allows Hill to interweave different narrative threads seamlessly. In truth, it can often feel like an arbitrary, predictable cliché to split up the main characters – especially within the trope-heavy horror genre – but here it works wonderfully, helping the reader to follow multiple story lines through the specific lens of the quirky characters who literally go down each path.

Visually, the cinematic artwork creates a palpable sense of foreboding and atmospheric tension that keep you on the edge of your seat. Illustrator Stuart Immonen’s brilliant compositions keep the action grounded in the eerie, exotic locale, even as they focus on the character’s faces and nonverbal reactions. Expressions are clear and precise, but always circle back to a subtle yet unspoken, collective sense of fear that contrasts perfectly with the jokey, wisecracking dialogue. Low angle close-up shots, looking up at the character from below their eyeline, accent the creepiness and keep the reader off balance, as though there’s always something lurking off the edge of the frame.

Of course, Dave Stewart does a masterful job on colors. Naturally, the night scenes are heavy on black, blue and purple, while the ship interior casts everything in the pale, luminous green of antiquated radar screens and other electronics. Whether inside or outside, at night or the morning after, Stewart punctuates his relatively uniform palettes with distinct splashes of color. From the red rubber rafts on shore to Moriah’s purple down coat to the bright yellow body bag, there’s always at least one element that grabs your eye and pulls you into the scene. In isolation, each panel is great. Collectively, they’re even better. These are pages that almost tell the whole story at a glance, and yet they also beg you to dive deeper and linger for a while.

In the end, all of the elements work together in concert to create a sum greater than each of the parts, and the parts were damn good in the first place. One third of the way through Joe Hill’s expertly told mini-series, we’ve been drawn down the dark, creepy, mysterious tunnel and there’s no way on earth we’re going to turn back now.

Final Verdict: 9.2 “Plunge” #2 seizes on the work that was done in the debut issue and takes the story to the next level, ratcheting up the tension and expanding the mystery. A great script and great art, dive in and enjoy.


John Schaidler

EMAIL | ARTICLES