REVIEW: Shadow Man #1

Writer: Andy Diggle
Artist: Stephen Segovia
Colors: Ulises Arreloa
Letterer: Simon Bowland
Review: Madman

When I picked up my books from the LCS I noticed the stack was largely populated by the Big 2.
Exactly four Marvel books, 1 DC book (because…Batman), and two Image books.
You know it’s gonna be a good day when you get the new issues of both Saga and Manifest Destiny on the same day.

Having literally reviewed each of the titles I picked up this week at least once before, I decided to scour the shelves for something other than my usual fare.
Enter Shadowman.
Not going to lie, there where a few other new #1s that started this week, but I totally grabbed this one based on of the cover. There were two different covers available, this one and one that was way less dramatic. I’m not sure which is the main cover or if one is printed more then the other; I just know this one is better. I had zero info on this book before I made the purchase, so I forged ahead in the name of science. 

Shadowman is the tale of Shadowman and his ex- girlfriend, Alyssa Myles (who happens to be a Mambo priestess) fighting the “good fight” against Samedi cultists and all kinds of creepy stuff crawling out of the bowels of The Big Easy. The whole tale is saturated heavily with Voodoo culture or religion or whatnot.
Way out of my element here, Donny. I’m about as well versed in Voodoo as I am in Egyptian hieroglyphics. We’re going on best guess here with some of the terminology, but I think I got the gist of it.

Alyssa and Jack, a.k.a. Shadowman, once were a couple, but Jack was basically trapped in the underworld, or Deadside, for five years for some reason or another. Alyssa casts a lot of, “spells”, in the same visual manner as Doctor Strange with the crazy glowy symbols and weird finger contortions, which is pretty neat in my opinion…
I mean, if it works for Strange why shouldn’t it work for her?
Jack’s gift/curse, letting him turn into a black, costume-clad Shadowman, works like the Human Torch’s ability to turn his power on and off as he chooses.
The story really didn’t progress far enough to get into the meat and bones of what the hell is really going on or who these people are, but you definitely get teased enough to want to find out.

The art was spot on and my favorite thing about the book. The story was good, but I’m not sure it will be able to hold my attention for long. With this art team’s collaboration of sweet, sweet eye candy, I’ll do my best.
On a side note this is the first book to come out of Valiant in a long time that I even remotely enjoyed.
In fact, I daresay this is the first Valiant comic that I actually enjoyed, so there’s that.