It’s 1985, Satanic panic is in the Californian air and Ethan Reckless has a new case: find the missing step-sister of a librarian - but is it too late?
Friend of the Devil is Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’ second Reckless book and it’s much less exciting than the first one unfortunately. That’s my biggest complaint: barely anything interesting happens for nearly 2/3rds of the book! The story is mostly a dull procedural as we watch Reckless slowly putting the pieces of the mystery together.
The case itself is unremarkable with aspects such as cliched Hollywood sleaze and stock Satanists with the usual dumb agenda. Still, it was informative in highlighting the influx of Vietnamese immigrants that arrived in America following the fall of Saigon, and the action finale isn’t bad.
As expected, given that this is by Brubaker/Phillips, Friend of the Devil is competently written and drawn, and it has its moments - it’s not a bad comic - but it’s just not as fun as the first book and is quite a forgettable story. Hopefully the third book, Destroy All Monsters, out later this year, will be more of a barnstormer.
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