Tuesday, March 15, 2011

House of Mystery v3: #12

The Space Between Part Two: Push and Pull by Matthew Sturges (writer), Luca Rossi (pencils), José Marzán (inks), and Lee Loughridge (colors) - As often, with stories like House of Mystery, just when I think I grasp where it is and where it is going the rug gets pulled out from beneath me. My guesses, after reading the previous chapter, about there being two throughlines seems somewhat off base. One of the throughlines seems to get split in this story and a new one is introduced.

There's a lot going on in this chapter: a new character (Genevieve) arrives in the House, Harry and Peter unintentionally leave the House (the building not the story), not to menton what gets revealed in the story within the story. As always Luca Rossi's art as colored by Lee Loughridge is beautiful and, for my money, evokes the right sort of mood for this sort of story.

When a story morphs as fast as this one does, as capriciously as this one does I get a little worried. I worry that not all the plot threads and snippets will get resolved or at the very least further attention. I worry that some of them are being introduced as smoke screens to help the writer get the story to where he feels it should be without revealing which cards he is holding. This isn't a fully justified fear. Serial fiction lends itself to weird twists and turns. I've seen it happen often enough. I don't know if Sturges has a long range plan for House of Mystery or is just making it up issue by issue, arc by arc but I am enjoying it and it wouldn't be the same without the weird and sudden twists in the tale.

A Cress in Every Port by Matthew Sturges, Grazia Lobaccaro (pencils), Stefano Landini (inks), Lee Loughridge (colors) - At first I thought this was going to be Cressida's origin story. I was wrong. It left me more puzzled than informed. It provides information but isn't conclusive. Additionally one should consider that the narrator, Genevieve, has fallen for Cress more than once in the past and her opinion may have colored the story so that it less resembles that than it does Genevieve's vision (romantic or otherwise) of past events.

House of Mystery is published by Vertigo, an imprint of DC Comics

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