Pearl Issue #1 Review

Pearl #1 Review

Pearl is centered around a beautiful tattoo artist with a mysterious spider tattoo who is also an assassin for the Yakuza located in San Francisco. When she runs afoul of another gang looking to start a turf war, she finds herself caught in the middle of it while wondering the larger than expected implications of her spider tattoo. This new book from the Brian Michael Bendis' Jinxworld imprint features the same original creative team behind Alias; Bendis writing, Gaydos on pencils, and Maleev on the cover and it also features Bendis' and Gaydos' first new original character since the explosively popular character, Jessica Jones.

Bendis returns to DC with a dark and dirty opening issue that doesn't really reveal too much aside from the main players, but offers some very tantatlizing threads that can hopefully pay off from the strong setup in this issue. Moody and atmospheric, the book is drenched in muted neon glows of San Francisco. Like the work of Wong Kar-wai, Gaydos' use of thematic coloring is stark and interesting. Highlighting the different worlds and locales of this new universe, this book promises even more stunning art in issues to come. As a bonus, Bendis' and Gaydos' own original Elseworlds short 'Citizen Wayne' is also included as an unaltered backup; it's a nice and surprising little omake.