Hack/Slash - From Devil's Due Press

Hack / Slash Ongoing Series - Issue 01

Written By: Tim Seeley
Art By: Emily Stone
Colors By: Courtney Via
Published By: Devil's Due Press
Released Date: 05-09-07

After several Mini-Series and One Shots, some expensive some affordable, we finally have an Ongoing Hack/Slash series. If you're not familiar with the world of Hack/Slash this issue does a fantastic job of getting you caught up without making it a boring origin story. In fact it was quite brilliantly put together, diving into the deeper psychology of the Main Character Cassandra Hack and in doing so making her flashback to the events in her life that make up her origin. Perhaps the same will be done again for our other Main character Vlad who had a One Shot I believe already dedicated to his origin.

So the premise of the Series is this: Cassandra and Vlad hunt Slashers. Slashers are Boogey-men, Serial Killers, all those Characters from Horror Movie Slashers, i.e. Freddy, Jason, Micheal Meyers, but instead of the story following the Slasher we're following the people that kill the them. Yeah that's right, there's no Arkham Asylum to send these nut-jobs to so death typically is the best answer. Typically they read a newspaper story or hear a news report and they head out to find the Slasher.

For the first issue, Cassandra uses herself as bait and gets captured by a Psychology Professor turned way evil. He's peeled off his skin to reveal a more 'Truer' self underneath and is more than likely going to do the same to Casandra. Being the interesting character that he is he wants to know what type of person seeks out a Slasher, making it oh so easy to psychoanalyze the captured Cassandra. Note he's cutting off her toes while he does this. The story does great on it's own so I'm not going to spout off all the intense, comedic or heartfelt moments of the story, I'd rather you read it and find them all for yourself.

I'd say the thing I like most about this book is that the Main Characters are human, there's the chance they'll die, or lose a limb, Casandra's toes won't grow back by the next issue they're gone for good. They don't have any money and live off of donations from family's they've helped or what the Slasher have on them. Sorta like Blade attempts to do but if you add up everything he spends and compares it to what he could potentially make you'd find he's living outside his means.

Overall I'd actually give this book a 9.0, it was the best Hack/Slash I've read thus far and has potential of being a good Ongoing Series. The art fit the story telling, the cover art is great too but don't be fooled it's not the same inside. Hopefully they won't fall victim to printing five covers a book to try and make a buck and focus on good story telling and having a consistent artist on the book. Ask for it at your local shop. Check out the write up for issue 2 on DDP's Site.



Here's a few pages of the book for you to check out!