DAMAGED Reading: HELLCITY: THE WHOLE DAMNED THING: A damned good read!

HELLCITY: THE WHOLE DAMNED THING
Macon Blair and Joe Flood
Image Comics
Review by Louis Fowler

I think about Hell. A lot. I know that, in our feel-good, no consequences society, it's no longer Kosher to believe in God, let alone the idea of eternal punishment for infractions against him, but, as I continually face my own mortality, I can't help but to dwell on it, the idea and the reasonings behind it and the need for it to keep our society in check.

If there is a Hell, then what is it exactly? An endless sea of fire and brimstone and tormented souls? A desolate, lonely wasteland where your pleas for forgiveness from God fall on deaf ears? A horrific final hallucination as the brain dies? Or, even worse and more apropos, the life we're living at this very moment?

I like Macon Blair and Joe Flood's take on the whole matter. In their finally-concluded masterpiece HELLCITY: THE WHOLE DAMNED THING (the first part of which was reviewed here a few years back), Hell is depicted as a modern-day demonically-possessed view of our own world, teeming with cruel demons doling out punishment on a whim while humans are the lowest rung on the societal ladder. The flies on the feces.

It makes sense when you think about it. Wouldn't Hell be a place where you can never live a normal life again? Surrounded by skewed versions of the world you once knew, walking around in a living nightmare? HELLCITY, written by Blair, is a brilliantly reasonable, fantastically realistic depiction of Hell, with artist Flood thisclose to being a latter-day Hieronymus Bosch—every Satanically-detailed panel is worthy of a magnifying glass inspection.

It's all viewed through the eyes of a hard-boiled private eye, sent to Hell for his Earthly suicide. He's hired by the upper echelons of Hellcity's government to keep tabs on Satan as he goes through an embarrassing mental breakdown. As the Devil goes off the rails on the crazy train, the political coups for power mount in the boardroom as the humans revolt against their oppressors on the streets. God even makes a not-so-benevolent cameo, offering a slight bit of comical hope.

HELLCITY: THE WHOLE DAMNED THING is the most original graphic novel to come along in years, a DANTE'S INFERNO for a pop-culture obsessed generation with no religious upbringing. It's diabolically cinematic and fully fleshed-out, well worth the three-year wait which, at the time, did seem like an eternity without any anticipation of salvation. Maybe sometimes prayers do get answered.

(This review originally appeared at Bookgasm.com)