When you think in comic books, one of the first thoughts to reach your mind are the names of Spiderman, Wonder Woman, Batman and Squirel Girl, all because the super heroes and the biggest brands are the ones who conform the market today by day, but in the vast world of writers and artist, there is plenty of them that take the time to give life to new concepts that normally, would be rejected, but manages to get an editorial to get published. Because of that, brands like Image, Dark Horse and Boom! Exist, and thanks to them, we have comics about Spawn, The Walking Dead, Hellboy and more. But sometimes, comics are published and they are great pieces of work, but are too short or just don’t get enough attention to be as recognized as they deserves.
Some comics are just destined to be under the radar, but not for that they don’t worth the read. With that in mind, I’ll tell some of the hidden gems in the comic book world. Just in case, this post have spoilers
Irresistible (From Zenescope Entertainment)
This comic was published in 2012 by Zenescope Entertainment, written by Raven Gregory. Here, the story is about Allen Keeg and how is deeply sad about his finished relationship with his girlfriend one year and a half ago, but recently he find out that she had a new boyfriend. After all that time, Allen never was able to move on and often embarrassed himself by calling his ex, begin and even writing poetry about her. His life would take a different way when he, after an unenjoyably night with his friends at the strip club, saves an old lady from a gang of thefts. In return, the old lady ask Allen about his wish, what he responds that he want to be irresistible for any woman, since he feel reject by all the women in his life, without knowing, the wish was going to be granted.
Since that night, every single woman on his path fined him sexually and emotionally irresistible. After a row of wild and spontaneous sex, he started to feel great with his life, but always find himself thinking about his ex and the obsessive love he has to her. Still not being able to move on, the girls on his life started to get aggressive and invasive, thinking that the way they feel about Allen was true love, finding out in the bad way how he wish tuned into a nightmare.
Trying to escape the curse he was in, realized that the only way was finding the old lady which later would present herself as Dalila of Sorek. She was, many centuries ago, the lover of Samson, who betrayed him and was cursed by an angel to live forever, learning all the magic arts available and dedicated to help those help her in danger situation, like the fake thief attempt Allen saved her from. As a solution to the curse, Dalila told Allen to kill his ex, because she was his loved one, and then the he would free to live his simple life. Thinking about his options, Allen find himself considering kill his ex, after being fired for skipping work and without any food because of the constant girls in his house and even kidnaped by a group of girls and raped. Mentally broken, he irrupts into his ex’s house after her new couple left and looking like he was not able of choosing any other options , stabbed her in the chest.
After all the sex he had and the girls who he was with, never realized how fake was how he felt about his ex, until almost 8 years in jail. Then he has tie to think how truly hurtful was idealizing someone just for enjoying to think that she is the one, regretting how the selfish wish turned his life into a nightmare until make a great sacrifice. The time passes but never was sure if the death of Leigh (His ex) actually worked until, while he was liberated; saw an army of women waiting for him outside, demanding his body and soul for them, tearing his skin and muscles apart until nothing remained.
Buzzkill (Dark Horse Comics)
Project published in 2014. This was written by Donny Cates and Mark Reznicek. The history is about Ruben’s constant search of forgiveness while he is in rehab for being alcoholic. In this world, Ruben used to be part of a superhero team of global defense until he quit after an incident that caused the death of millions of people in a fight with a super villain. What this team doesn’t know is that Ruben (which true name is Francis, but he keep it in secret while rehab) needs to consume substances to gain superpowers, especially alcohol, reason of his disease.
At the beginning all the rehabilitation process looks difficult to accept for Ruben, but thanks to his counselor Wayne and his ex-workmate Eric, his start to understand the importance of moving on. By the next meeting of the rehab group, Ruben realizes that Wayne is actually a robot who is secretly attempting to get all the possible information of his private life with the rest of his rouge gallery. This makes Wayne attack Ruben, but before Ruben had opportunity to strike back, all the villains appeared to kill him. With Eric’s help, he manages to get some wine and help his un-advantaged friend. His drunken state makes him extremely dangerous and violent, defeating all his enemies but worrying Eric, who calls Dr.Blaqk (a powerful sorcerer to stop the massacre. Blaqk vanish all the villains and turn Ruben back to normal, then started to explain that be will be his new tutor while trying to rehabilitate.
Following Dr.Blaqk’s steps to recover his life, Ruben start by apologizing to his old teammates for all the disasters, lies and personal problems he caused. Then tried to apologize to Nikki, his ex-girlfriend, who is secretly dating Eric now, causing a fight between them, but in some way, showing how is Ruben trying to be a better man and leaving behind his awful behavior. Before having chance to getting along with each other, the hospital explode revealing that the villain that caused the incident witch Ruben has awake from his coma, and the only one to be able of defeat him is Ruben itself.
Courtland Pierce, the villain, was actually Ruben’s father. Angry for notice that Ruben was trying to give up his powers and true self, his father goes after Nikki, killing Eric in the process. Full of hate, Ruben desperately goes after his father, who always blamed him for his mother’s death in the birth, and decide to once more get drunk and gaining his powers back to defeat his father this one and for all. This time was different from the others, and after saying goodbye to Nikki, revealing that he always loved her even after breaking up with him, and then goes to fight his father. Finally killing him, Ruben realizing that his mistakes were too big to leave them in the past, and someway they’ll all back for him until they eventually kills him, the only way to stop them would keep hurting his loved ones, keeping active his alcoholism. Understanding this, he commits suicide by fly into deep space and accepting that he was not able to be truly fixed.
Huck (Image Comics)
The first issue of this comic was released in 2015. Is a series of 6 numbers, written by Mark Millar, the same writer of famous saga of Kick-Ass. In this comic, we see the history of Huck, a humble worker at a gas station who lives in a small town of U.S.A., he, as everyone in the town has a secret. Huck was abandoned by his mother when he was a baby, leaved to an orphanage, where he was raised by good ladies who teach him how to doing well just because it was the right thing. Huck grows with this lesson, but he was also able to find anything in the world and having super human strength and durability. As an adult he is a peaceful and quiet person who enjoys using his gifts to help secretly to the people of the town, until a woman named Diane moves in. She is ask to keep Huck’s secret but she doesn’t and in matter of hours, people from news of all the country start looking for him and the reason o his acts.
How Huck helps the people is one of the most honestly made behaviors I’ve ever seen. The way he just made every day a list of possible good actions with no intensions of being rewarded is the most beautiful way of portraying the feeling of help and been able to. Huck is simple at the beginning, shows how him is helping some farmer to free space on his yard, helps a Diane to find a gold chain that she accidently dump and even goes to Africa to help some hostages students and giving them candies, just asking to keep the secret for him. Then the governor tries to take advantage of Huck’s good will to being reelected, but eventually this just didn’t feel right to Huck.
A lost brother shows up some time later and then starts talking to Huck about his lost mother, talking about how his mother was a Russian super soldier experiment which was pregnant of twins. Huck and his brother Tom, start looking for his mother, thing that was easy thanks to Huck’s search ability. When they found their mother, Anna, she tried to be happy about the situation, but then she said that she had just one son. Tom was actually a cyborg, created by Dr. Orlov, the responsible of the super soldier project, to find Huck and his mother and send them back to a secret city in Russia to continue with the project. Eventually, Huck and his mother are able to escape by working together. Anna has the ability to hypnotize with his touch, power that she uses to erase every single piece of evidence about the project and all the science related knowledge from Orlov’s mind.
Like these comic books, there plenty more who offer a unique history, showing how the industry can be used to experimental characters and moral perspectives inside the human nature and exploring incredible worlds with new ways of treating the histories we all know, making them a totally new concept to be interested in. Even the biggest brands had in their files, great comics who had little audience, like DC’s “Empire” or Marvel’s “Nemesis”. Searching every day for a new story to tell, some of them are born out of the spotlight to being turned into little gems hidden between the shelves in the stores, such as Mike Carey’s (Who worked on Hellblazer and Lucifer) “Suicide Risk”, Mike Mignolas’s “Frankenstein Underground” or even Grant Morrison’s “Animal Man” from DC. There is a big world out there and it worth to explore the comics that are created daily.