Tag Archives: triona farrell

Any Given Smile #1 Delivers Creepy Just in time for Football and Spooky Season

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Any Given Smile #1

January 1995. All eyes are on the American Arena League football championship game in St. Augustine, Florida. The Sharks gear up for the most significant event in the AAL’s 20-year history, and Maximillian Dupree—their sudden-star backup quarterback—is feeling the pressure from his teammates, his fans, and his debts to the city’s gambling underworld. A string of suicides hits the community hard, drawing a desperate sports journalist to examine their connection to the big game. No one can trust anything they see as a mind-bending entity and its frightful visions threaten their payouts, their sanity, and their lives… Any Given Smile #1 mixes the horror franchise with “Sunday’s game” bringing even more horror to football.

I’ve never seen any of the Smile movies or read the previous comic the spun off from it. So coming into Any Given Smile #1, I was a blank slate as far as knowledge and expectations. And after reading the first issue, I want to find out more. Written by Stephanie Williams, the comic mixes horror and football as the issue builds towards the big game.

The debut issue is an interesting one, teasing out what’s going on for new readers while fans of the franchise likely have a better idea of what’s going on. Individuals dealing with sports betting are all dying and all have had a contorted smile on their face. Like a virus spread around, the comic feels like it could deliver solid commentary on the proliferation of online sports betting and the damage it causes to far too many individuals.

While the original film focuses on horror through trauma, this series feels like a spin on that, the horror of virality and addiction. Everyone who dies, or is likely to die, feeds off of the addiction of gambling whether they themselves caught in it or serving others who do. It’s an interesting metaphor through horror, something the genre can excel in.

The art by Pablo Collar creates an unease throughout the issue. With color by Triona Farrell and lettering by Ariana Maher, the comic’s visuals and lettering build the general vibe of the comic with visuals teasing the madness going on. This isn’t horror with gore and violence as the draw, instead it’s visuals you can’t trust of formless beings haunting their prey. It’s a comic that builds its tension throughout leaving readers to guess what’s going on and what images they can trust. The lettering by Maher especially stands out not only emphasizing the haunting sounds individuals hear but also very cool visuals with it as well with dialogue featuring scratches out at points.

Any Given Smile #1 is a solid debut that has me intrigued and wanting to learn more, and see and read, what has previously come out. It’s a horror story that feels like it has something to say, a commentary on the current tech push of online gambling and all of the ills that it can lead to. Overall, one that’s well worth checking out if you want horror with some depth to it.

Story: Stephanie Williams Art: Pablo Collar
Color: Triona Farrell Letters: Ariana Maher
Story: 8.0 Art: 8.0 Overall: 8.0 Recommendation: Buy

IDW Publishing provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review

Purchase: Zeus Comics – Kindle

Showdown #4 has Trish exploring what she didn’t know about her brother

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It’s the last day before the showdown, and both Harvey and Trish have to face some hard truths. For Trish, she is starting to see that her brother may not have been the perfect young man she thought he was. For Harvey, it’s that there isn’t as much in his life to settle as he thought there might be. And for both, it’s the very real fact that the town they call home has very little regard for either of them. This penultimate issue sets up everything before the real final showdown begins.

Story: Dave Wielgosz
Art: Tadd Calusha
Color: Triona Farrell
Letterer: Clayton Cowles

Get your copy now!

Zeus Comics

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Showdown #3 puts the spotlight on Trish as we learn her life is more messed up than we were told

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Trish’s loss began the day her brother died. The grief that followed has taken so much more, and her vengeance means losing all the happiness she found when she went away to school. The question on everyone’s mind: will making Harvey pay for what he did be worth it?

Story: Dave Wielgosz
Art: Tadd Calusha
Color: Triona Farrell
Letterer: Clayton Cowles

Get your copy now! To find a comic shop near you, visit http://www.comicshoplocator.com or call 1-888-comicbook or digitally and online with the links below.

Zeus Comics

This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site

Justice League: Dream Girls #4 shows both the triumphant and sad sides of queer identity

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Justice League: Dream Girls #4

Jadzia Axelrod, Nicole Maines, Stein & Brandt, Rosi Kampe, Triona Farrell, and Dearbhla Kelly wrap up their beautiful, action-packed, and soul-searing Pride Month event in Justice League: Dream Girls #4. Most of this issue is set in the Kampe-drawn dream dimension, where Galaxy fights to save her BFF Dreamer from the clutches of the Key, who is very close to having infinite knowledge that will transform him from that one villain you vaguely remember getting knocked out by a boxing glove arrow in Grant Morrison’s JLA run to an A-list baddie. It cements the bond between Galaxy and Dreamer while setting them on two quite different, yet valid heroic paths. Axelrod and Maines give both heroines full arcs while leaving room for either them or other creators to play in the sandbox. In addition to wrapping up the weekly crossover event, JL: Dream Girls #4 features a powerful, personal black and white autobiographical comic from the legendary Klaus Janson about growing up as a gay, immigrant cartoonist in the 1960s and 1970s.

To start, it’s been such a pleasure to follow JL: Dream Girls each week and see transgender superheroes written by transgender comics creators get to be front and center in a big summer crossover with such a buffet of different art styles and a huge cast of characters, LGBTQ+ otherwise. (Batman is a trans ally, y’all!) And it wouldn’t be a summer crossover with some badass fisticuffs, and JL: Dream Girls #4 doesn’t disappoint. There’s a surreal action-horror vibe to Rosi Kampe and Kelly’s visuals, with interesting panel layouts as Galaxy flies around and tries to get Dreamer to literally wake up and not be married to the Key. For example, while Dreamer is under the Key’s thrall, the gutters are black, but when she gets her act together, they’re different colors or non-existent. Kampe’s line art and Dearbhla Kelly’s colors go from something light and almost trance-like to solid and punchy as the story progresses. As someone who has put on a variety of identities throughout the series, it’s so empowering to see Dreamer finally be herself in JL: Dream Girls #4’s climax.

After the big fight, JL: Dream Girls #4 has an extended epilogue that’s drawn by Stein & Brandt and colored by Farrell, who have done an excellent job on the Watchtower sequences throughout the series, giving this large cast of characters their own unique personalities, sometimes with a single eye movement or head tilt. (I live for Jon Kent’s eyes lighting up and wanting to play DnD even though Damian Wayne says it’s for nerds.) The use of “Bwahahaha” all but confirms, but they’re worthy successors to the superhero sitcom era of J.M. DeMatteis, Keith Giffen, and Kevin Maguire’s Justice League. The highlight of this part of the story is a conversation between Batman and Dreamer, where he tells her that if someone is uncomfortable with her being simply present in a space, that’s their problem. It brings the superhero/queerness/trans metaphor full circle and means a lot because it’s DC’s biggest seller saying those words. Jadzia Axelrod and Nicole Maines have done a wonderful job telling a story that is both a sci-fi/superhero epic with psychological dimensions that also works as a personal tale of two very different transgender women coming to terms with who they are. It was in the previous issue, but Coagula and Dreamer talking about being transgender lesbians is an all-time great moment in superhero comics. Finally, Galaxy and Dreamer are just awesome friends, and I hope they have many more adventures either as part of the Justice League or together. (DC editorial, we need a JLQ ongoing.)

After the colorful triumphs of the lead story, the black and white backup story from Janson entirely switches tone, and I appreciate the reader’s advisory between them. He gives a stark portrayal of what it was like to be a gay man in the 60s and 70s, with bullying, slurs, and not having heroes like Galaxy and Dreamer to look up to. However, young Klaus finds hope through superhero comics, which are the only part of the story done in color and give him an escape as he struggles to fit in with the oppressive society around him. Another place of escape for him is one of the first Pride parades that happened after Stonewall, and it’s cool to see the LGBTQ+ culture of the era, like when Klaus shows another young man his art portfolio after getting an early assignment at DC Comics. There’s also a shift in Klaus Janson’s art style as he grows in confidence in himself as an artist and gay man, before culminating in that iconic style that defined Batman and Daredevil for generations of heroes. And, personally, I love that a queer person like myself is partially responsible for those dark stories that were important to me growing up and still are to this day. I appreciate that Mr. Janson was able to share something so personal in such a beautiful way and that DC continues to publish autobiographical stories by LGBTQ+ creators.

Justice League: Dream Girls #4 shows both the triumphant and sad sides of queer identity through its punching and friendship-filled lead story and its sobering, yet hopeful backup story. It’s the perfect comic to read during the last week of Pride Month.

Story: Jadzia Axelrod, Nicole Maines, Klaus Janson
Art: Stein & Brandt, Rosi Kampe, Klaus Janson 
Colors: Triona Farrell, Dearbhla Kelly
Letters: Jodie Troutman, Frank Cvetkovic, Lucas Gattoni
Story: 9.0 Art: 9.5 Overall: 9.3 Recommendation: Buy

DC Comics provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review

Purchase: Zeus Comics – Kindle

Smile and A Quiet Place Expand their Terrifying Worlds With IDW Dark

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From the big screen into the pages of comics, IDW Dark presents spine-chilling new chapters inspired by the hit Paramount Pictures horror franchises Smile and A Quiet Place.

Scaring comic shops this September is Any Given Smile, a frightening five-issue story crafted by Eisner Award-nominated writer Stephanie Williams, GLAAD Media Award-winning artist Pablo Collar, and featuring colors by Triona Farrell and letters by Ariana Maher.  

The year is 1995 and all eyes are on the American Arena League football championship game. The Sharks gear up for the most significant event in the AAL’s 20-year history, and their sudden-star backup quarterback is feeling the pressure from his teammates, his fans, and his debts to the city’s gambling underworld. A string of suicides hits the community hard, drawing a suspicious sports journalist deeper into that world to examine their connection to the big game.  No one can trust anything or anyone as a mind-bending and mysterious Smile Entity and its horrifying visions threaten their payouts, their sanity, and their lives…

Shhhhh. Don’t make a sound this November when A Quiet Place: Rising Tides crawls into comic shops. The tense and captivating five-issue thriller is created by the acclaimed duo of writer Declan Shalvey and artist Luke Sparrow, featuring colorist Colin Craker and letterer Jodie Troutman.

When a young woman named Grace tracked down her estranged father to a run-down houseboat in the Florida Keys, she expected disappointment, resentment, maybe even closure. Instead, the entire world ended.

Now stranded in the aftermath of the invasion that shattered civilization, she and her sick, aging father cling to survival on the open water – the only space safe from the creatures who attack at the sound of a single breath. But his oxygen is running low, supplies are disappearing quickly, and the deadly predators circling the shoreline are learning fast. And on the horizon, a hurricane is coming.

A QUIET PLACE RISING TIDES

Showdown #1 is a solid debut with a simple concept that allows it to focus on its characters

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Some things you just can’t get over.

When Trish Sullivan left her hometown for college, she left behind unfinished business. Now she’s back and looking to settle up.

Trish blames Harvey Harlowe for the death of her little brother, so Trish’s homecoming is an eye-for-an-eye mission. She’s going to kill him, and Harvey should get his affairs in order.

But Harvey’s dad has just died, and an injury destroyed his football scholarship. Without a future ahead of him, Trish’s challenge is all the more welcome. He’s more than ready to go down fighting, and no one is going to step in and save him.

Story: Dave Wielgosz
Art: Tadd Calusha
Color: Triona Farrell
Letterer: Clayton Cowles

Get your copy now! To find a comic shop near you, visit http://www.comicshoplocator.com or call 1-888-comicbook or digitally and online with the links below.

Zeus Comics

This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site

DC Pride 2025 is an ambitious comic that takes the time to dig into the characters’ individual hopes, fears, and dreams

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DC Pride 2025 #1 is a little different from the previous installments of DC Pride in that it’s not a collection of short stories featuring LGBTQ+ DC Comics characters, but is a single narrative centered around a gay bar that Alan Scott frequented in the 1930s and told predominantly from the POV of a new character named Ethan, who is a trans military veteran that ends up caught up a kind of multiversal/elemental saga. I applaud the scope of this comic book, which has big jam session energy as different characters end up in different pocket realities based on wishes they made at the gay bar or graffiti they scrawled. We get Apollo and Midnighter living in 1950s domestic bliss courtesy of Sam Maggs and Derek Charm, a single, psychiatric girl boss Harley Quinn from Maya Houston, Max Sarin, and Marissa Louise ; and a gorgeous sapphic romance between Jo Mullein and Nubia from Houston, Vita Ayala, and Vincent Cecil to name a few. The reading effect is like jumping from comic to comic and look at paths not trodden with some iconic queer characters and a few new or not so iconic ones.

As Tim Sheridan, Giulio Macaione, and Emilio Pilliu Alan Scott-centric frame story shows, fighting supervillains and having superpowers is a metaphor for being queer in DC Pride 2025. It might be tempting to give up and lie low, especially with the United States’ hard turn to fascism, and homophobia and transphobia promoted by folks in power, but Alan Scott, Ethan, and their companions’ actions in the comic act as a clarion call to resistance. The stuff with the Crimson Flame and Scott having his own Red Lantern is a little Geoff Johnsian for my taste, but it’s so cool to watch Alan Scott have a Sailor Moon type transformation sequence and return into action to help save the next generation of queer heroes symbolized by Ethan. I love Macaione’s use of greens to show a possible, idyllic future for Scott and a non-Red Lantern/Russian spy Johnny Ladd, but it’s a happiness based on a lie like the other possible futures in the book.

However, DC Pride 2025 isn’t all serious action and has a lot of humor and playfulness. Jude Ellison S. Doyle and Alex Moore recontextualize Golden Age Z-list Wonder Woman villain Blue Snowman coming to terms with their gender fluidity alongside nonbinary superhero Envoy in one vignette. I love how they poke fun at the restrictions of the gender binary using the classic tropes of a superhero brawl, and how even well meaning cisgender people can be just plain annoying at times. It’s so cool seeing this kind of story and voice in a mainstream, corporate comic showing that nonbinary characters don’t just have to be righteous heroes, but can be kind of messy too. DC Pride 2025 really hits the spectrum of queer identities, including asexuality with Connor Hawke getting a short story where he resists his father’s reputation as a womanizer and just wants to live his own life. I have to give a special shout out to Philip Sevy’s art in this short sequence, which seems like it’s right out of the late 1990s period where he was member of the JLA. Both the visual and character variety of DC Pride 2025 makes it an engaging read, and the book is a testament to the active work that DC Comics has done to cultivate LGBTQ+ characters in the past decade or so. (I need a monthly Midnighter and/or Apollo book though.)

After a wild and wacky cosmic adventure set in the DC Multiverse, DC Pride 2025 wraps up with a beautiful nonfiction story from Jenny Blake and Sara Soler about Blake coming out as a transgender woman earlier this year. It has gorgeous soft lines and a refreshing color palette to go with Jenny Blake’s honest and humorous script about how old comics about Clark Kent switching genders had an influence on her own gender identity journey. I love how Soler inserts different DC characters into the panel to blur the line between fantasy and non-fiction with Blake’s most famous co-creation Black Lightning making an appearance as well as transgender superheroine Dreamer, who shares coffee with Blake. The story shows that you’re never too old to be your authentic self and hints at a longer graphic memoir, which I hope Jenny Blake gets to realize at DC or elsewhere.

DC Pride 2025 is an ambitious comic with summer crossover energy that tells an epic story with DC’s LGBTQ+ characters while still taking time to dig into their individual hopes, fears, and dreams. It’s a showcase of queer representation on the page and on the issue’s creative teams, and Blake and Sara Soler’s memoir is a beautiful coda and rallying cry to continue to be queer and fearless in an increasingly dark and hateful world.

Story: Vita Ayala, Jude Ellison S. Doyle, Maya Houston
Story: Sam Maggs, Tim Sheridan, Josh Trujillo, Jenny Blake
Art: Don Aguillo, Vincent Cecil, Derek Charm, A.L. Kaplan, Giulio Macaione
Art: Emilio Pilliu, Max Sarin, Philip Sevy, Sara Soler, Alex Moore, Skyler Patridge
Colors: Eren Angiolini, Jordie Bellaire, Triona Farrell, Marissa Louise
Letters: Aditya Bidikar, Frank Cvetkovic, Lucas Gattoni, Ariana Maher, Morgan Martinez, Jodie Troutman
Story: 8.9 Art: 9.3 Overall: 9.1 Recommendation: Buy

DC Comics provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review

Purchase: Zeus Comics – Kindle

A new Batman: Dark Patterns story arc, “Pareidolia,” begins on June 11

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DC has released an early look at Batman: Dark Patterns #7 which kicks off the third case in the series.

When a dead body is found burned to a crisp in the heart of one of Gotham’s oldest neighborhoods, the Rookery, the Dark Knight Detective finds himself enmeshed in a twisting murder mystery dating back to the early days of the Red Hood Gang.

The third case (Case 03: Pareidolia) in this incredible comic book series by Dan Watters, Hayden Sherman, Tríona Farrell, and Frank Cvetkovic, will run through Batman: Dark Patterns issues #7, 8 and 9, and comes to comic shops June 11.

Batman: Dark Patterns #7

Batman: Dark Patterns #1 kicks off an intriguing murder mystery

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Batman: Dark Patterns #1

Set during the early years of Batman’s career, Batman: Dark Patterns delves into four mysterious cases as he attempts to cement his place as Gotham City’s protector while the city itself Fights back against him. This is the Dark Knight Detective at his most stripped-down core, a man relying on his wits, his skills, and little else as he tackles some of the most twisted mysteries Gotham City and its protector have ever encountered. Case 01: We Are Wounded A series of sickeningly gruesome murders has sent shock waves through Gotham. Are these the random works of a serial killer, or is there something more sinister at play? Batman attempts to get to the bottom of the mystery before any more victims are claimed. Batman: Dark Patterns #1 is an interesting start to what feels like a bit of a classic vibe of a Batman story.

Written by Dan Watters, Batman: Dark Patterns #1 is an interesting comic. It’s a back to basics in some ways take on the character. Taking place early in his career, the relationships are thin and the story itself is rooted more in the detective aspect of the character with some fantastical elements.

The story is a good murder mystery, one that would feel like it was below Batman today in some ways with his rogue gallery. Instead, three murders have taken place, but how are they connected? Are they connected at all? And who or what is behind them? That gets Batman to do his detective things, eschewing his fancy computers he’d use today and instead getting his hands dirty needing to get evidence and figure out what it all means. It’s nice in some ways to see the world’s Greatest Detective to actually have to do detective work and not just crunch things on a computer.

For as grounded as the story is, Watters still introduces a new villain who’s… interesting. Not to spoil, but the character is, for me, difficult to look at with a horror aspect to him that really emphasizes the vibe that underlies the comic. The new character is an impressive addition that triggered for me every little issue I have with some visuals, it caused an unease, which isn’t a bad thing. It’s impressive visual work to deliver that in a somewhat grounded sense.

Part of the grounded aspect to the comic is Hayden Sherman‘s art. There’s an almost classic feel to it, and it reminds me of some of the Batman comics of the 80s I remember reading. Add in color by Triona Farrell and lettering by Frank Cvetkovic and the visuals feel like a nice retro vibe in some ways that matches the storytelling. The team creates a vibe that’s reminiscent of Se7en in some ways and the art amplifies the unsettling nature of the murders and story.

Batman: Dark Patterns #1 is a solid start. It delivers a debut that feels like it emphasizes the detective aspect of the character while infusing horror aspects that could make readers wince at the visuals. It’s a nice beginning for what should be an entertaining Batman series.

Story: Dan Watters Art: Hayden Sherman
Color: Triona Farrell Letterer: Frank Cvetkovic
Story: 8.25 Art: 8.25 Overall: 8.25 Recommendation: Buy

DC Comics provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review

Purchase: Zeus Comics – Kindle

DC Announces Batman: Dark Patterns by Dan Watters and Harden Sherman

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DC has announced new twelve-issue comic book series by Dan Watters and Hayden Sherman, Batman: Dark Patterns, focused on a new cycle of crimes for the World’s Greatest Detective to crack. Set during the early years of Batman’s career, Batman: Dark Patterns delves into four mysterious cases as he attempts to cement his place as Gotham City’s protector while the city itself fights back against him. This is the Dark Knight Detective at his most stripped-down core, a man relying on his wits, his skills, and little else as he tackles some of the most twisted mysteries Gotham City and its protector have ever encountered.

Batman: Dark Patterns will be told as a series of four self-contained, street level, evergreen Batman mysteries exploring the early days of Batman’s place within Gotham City and his healing presence within its streets.

The first case and story arc, “We Are Wounded,” involves a series of sickeningly gruesome murders sending shock waves through Gotham City. Are these the random works of a serial killer, or is there something more sinister at play? Across these first three issues of Batman: Dark Patterns, Batman attempts to get to the bottom of the mystery before any more victims are claimed.

Batman: Dark Patterns #1, written by Watters, art by Sherman, color by Tríona Farrell and lettering by Frank Cvetkovic, will publish on December 11 with covers by Sherman and a variant cover by Stevan Subic. 

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