I reviewed the premiere issue of Death Head here and was excited to read the second installment. I was not disappointed as this title from Dark Horse Comics just keeps getting better.
The comic opens up with two utility company workers going down into the sewers to investigate water levels rising due to backed up drains. They find that the tunnel is chock-full of ravenous rats and one of them meets a grisly demise.
Next we see Niles at the doctor’s office after coming back from their babymoon. He has a piece of bone embedded in his leg that has to be removed, although it is not his own. He then makes a call to the Shadowcliff National Park Service’s Ranger Station to complain about their vacation from Hell.
He is obviously and reasonably upset by their brush with death at the crematorium. Instead of getting some sort of apology, they accuse him of trespassing on private property, and sell him some story about it being an old mining town. He doesn’t like their explanations and decides to do some digging of his own. What he finds will haunt him for the rest of this book.
We then transition to Bee who has made it out of the sewer that the bullies threw him into in the last issue. He is back in school and is looking for some books in the library when the main bully arrives to make more trouble for him. He gets some help with the books and the bully from Rosie, the little girl in the sewer from the last issue, who we find is actually a ghost.
We then encounter Maggie, the rebellious daughter, as she is literally racing home from Catholic School to attend a family dinner that Justine has planned in order to tell the children that she is pregnant. Instead of the nice family dinner she wanted, Maggie argues with Justine while Niles just sits there checked out from reality.
Everyone leaves the table without the big news being shared and Justine goes up to their bedroom to check on Niles who hasn’t been quite the same since they got back. Niles confides to her that he has been having visions and nightmares since they have returned. She tells him that is probably just stress due to the new baby, family problems they have been having, and their horrible vacation.
She then convinces him to get rid of the mask he has been carrying around since their trip. He discards it in the trash where it is found by Bee who wants to use it as a Halloween costume. Bee dons the mask and is shocked to find that he can see through the eyes of the Plague Doctor. He then stands there stunned as he watches him slay the utility worker that got away earlier.
The classic horror themes and tropes throughout the book continue to hit the mark. The artwork is once again astonishing, but the award goes to the dialogue in this issue. The transitioning from one part of the story to the next was executed much cleaner this go around, although it’s not completely there yet.
There are still questions left unanswered but there were enough pieces to the puzzle revealed to give you a glimpse of the bigger picture and leave you wanting to come back for the third installment.
I would recommend picking up this comic and adding it to your pull list because if this issue is any indicator, it can only get even more awesome from here on out.
Death Head # 2 is written and created by brothers Zack and Nick Keller. It features the artwork of Joanna Estep with the coloring done by Kelly Fitzpatrick and lettering by John J. Hill. The cover is the work of E. M. Gist. It debuted on August 19th 2015 and the third issue is set to come out on September 16th 2015.
