Written by Ron Marz
Illustrated by Sami BasriIs she a hero? Is she a villain? Voodoo is on the run in the new DC Universe, trying to stay one step ahead of her pursuers, using all of her considerable skills to complete a mission that will put the entire Earth in danger. DC’s sexy, edgy new series goes into overdrive with one of the most unexpected opening scenes ever!
Spoiler alert: no one hangs out in a strip club this issue. Now that we’ve weeded out the stripping enthusiasts, the review is after the jump.
The night before I read Voodoo #2, I spent an evening watching the movie L.A. Confidential on DVD. To make it clear: I love L.A. Confidential. I love how violent, tawdry, black-humored, and downright sleazy it is, and I love how it’s all of those things while still dressing sharply and manifesting trace amounts of wit. If I had chosen something else to watch that evening, I doubt I’d have the same reaction to this issue of Voodoo that I’m about to express.
Another thing I like is goofy old WildC.A.T.s comics, and the more sinister Wildcats that Joe Casey did back when WildStorm was still a going concern. I remember Voodoo from those: flighty, flirty, moody, occasionally hijacked into stories by Alan Moore that have little to do with anything but mystical curiosity. When I read Voodoo #1 last month, I wasn’t really sure what to make of it. It had the token shock violence and sexy sexual sex of an old Image book, but its atmosphere seemed to be both tongue-in-cheek and earnest at the same time. I didn’t have as much of an issue with all of the female objectification as some — if only because I assumed that she’d go become a WildC.A.T. or whatever in an issue anyway — but I definitely found the issue wanting. Now, with #2, I think I see what Ron Marz and Sami Basri are going for.
Voodoo is a James Ellroy comic book, more or less. Sure, that’s a glib analogy, and you could poke about a thousand holes in it within seconds. On a purely skin-deep level, though, I think that it’s a good enough comparison. Ellroy’s swift and brutal tales of corruption, violence, and sleaze in L.A. are a distant cousin of Voodoo, which is a tale of — well, violence and sleaze, certainly. Where Marz and Basri’s vision breaks away is in how no one seems particularly enmeshed in the shadier side of things. FBI Agent Fallon sleeps with her partner, but it never feels like quite the ethical morass it should. Voodoo is corraled by federal agents on a public street, but it never feels like pandemonium, which is what I’d expect if a goddamn dropship dumped a load of armored alien hunters anywhere near my block.
Like its title character’s shapeshifting, Voodoo just puts on costumes. At its core, it’s a game of cat and mouse, between Agent Fallon (and the forces she represents) and Voodoo — the fed chasing the space alien walking among us. Everything else, from the lengthy opening bedroom scene, to the gangbangers leering at Voodoo on the street, to Fallon and Voodoo’s confrontation in an abandoned hotel, acts like it’s supposed to be titillating, or ambiguously threatening, or creepy. It’s not really any of these things, and as a result, it’s hard to get worked up over. It’s competent, but 20 pages of competency only carries so far.
What Voodoo has is potential. It could become a straightforward chase-the-alien semi-sci-fi series. It could turn into a wandering-hero thing, as Voodoo legs it from city to city. Or it could plunge full-tilt into the darkness it plays at. That’d be the most risky option, but it has the biggest possible payoff. They seem to want to tease at it, but only ephemerally — why not just go whole-hog? It’s the difference between being just another 20 pages to mark time every Wednesday, and being something genuinely sick and thrilling, tracing lines of corruption, deceit, and passion in places the other New 52 books are ill-equipped to go.
Final Verdict: 6.5 – Like I said, competent, and not unappealing
