Sons of the Devil Vol 2 by Brian Brucellato

Rating: WARTY!

This story borrows heavily from the TV show Hannibal, exhibiting all of the gore, and none of the finesse. The bad psycho guy (as opposed to the “good” psycho guy) sees himself with horns when he looks into the mirror. I read volume one and didn’t like it, but I’d already committed to the first two volumes. I was sorry to see that volume two was no better. Volume one had ended with what looked like it might be an interesting turn, but that went nowhere in this volume, which was simply more of the same mindless violence, confused and plodding story, pointless flashbacks, and indifferent artwork. I quit reading it at 60% in when the psycho guy came home to find his live-in girlfriend packing an overnight bag for a trip, and he got into a fight with her brother. This guy has absolutely no redeeming qualities whatsoever. Why would I want to read a story that glories in violence and has not a thing else to offer? Short answer: I wouldn’t. I cannot recommend this series at all.

Sons of the Devil Vol 1 by Brian Brucellato

Rating: WARTY!

This was a graphic novel about a psychopath who was a baby when his parents were killed, and now he has issues galore, the worst of which is that he leads with his fists for no good reason. The guy is a complete jerk and totally uninteresting, not even from the tired trope of having heterochromia iridum. The story isn’t helped by numerous flashbacks. Half of the time I had no idea what was going on. The real problem though, was that the other half of the time, I really didn’t care.

The basic plot line is that the main character is a baby in a crib when both his parents have their skulls smashed by some psycho wielding a small mallet. The baby is spared because he is the chosen one. Then we jump to the present where he’s a grown-up who loves his dog, but hates people to the point where he’d rather put his fist in their face than shake their hand. Mallet-Man comes back into the guy’s life and kills again.

The guy is supposed to be in therapy, but it isn’t helping. There are several (apparently - it was too hard to keep track of them all) others like this guy – with the mismatched eyes, but what roles they played, other than two of them helping him cheat justice, was a mystery to me. I didn’t like the story, but I was committed to reading two volumes of this unfortunately. The art work wasn’t bad but it was too scratchy and angular for my taste. I cannot recommend the series based on this volume.