Midnight Mystery #1
Alterna Comics
Written & drawn by: Bernie Gonzalez
Letters by: Wes Locher
Hot off the press from Alterna Comics, comes issue 1 in a 4 issue run of Midnight Mystery. Ezekiel King is a detective with a nose for the supernatural, and we find him in issue 1 on the trail of a missing son of a deceased old Hollywood actor, that played out his last few years as the host to old time horror movies on TV. Written and drawn by Bernie Gonzalez with letters from Wes Locher, this is a fun introduction to the series. Gonzalez has a retro cartoony style to his art, the front cover could almost be from The Spirit, but it’s a style that fits the writing.
The story itself is one we are all familiar with. Detective is hired to find missing person, leading to dangerous situations, but the twist here is there is no doubt about the supernatural events that may transpire. The lead character Ezekial King, is an old hand when it comes to weird situations, and he commits them all to reel to reel tapes for his own piece of mind. As a reader, we are led to then expect some spooky goings on. “Zeke” to his friends, sets out on his latest mystery, and we are invited along for the ride. This is a nice book with a great lead character and an interesting premise. The pacing is what I would call a slow burner, but by the end of the issue I was wanting to see more, always a good sign.
The art has a simplistic style, and it reminded me of Batman The Animated Series. Things look very retro, but we are never really told when the series is set. Characters use pay phones, and the phone in the car is literally a phone, in a car, but I enjoy that kind of ambiguity and it adds to the overall atmosphere of the book.
Midnight Mystery is another in a great line of comics from Alterna, and I urge you to pick this up if you see it. The cover price of $1.50 is ridiculously low for the content, and if your LCS doesn’t have this on their shelf, urge them to order it, or go straight to Alterna online and get it yourself. I will definitely be sticking round for the rest of the series.