Comics
Advance Review: Undertow # 2
Pushing into unknown territory is never easy. The excitement of discovery comes hand in hand with the dangers of loss. For the crew of The Deliverer the ideals of settlement are contested while the small crew on land comes to terms with the dangers of being intrepid in another layered and stellar issue of “Undertow.”
WRITTEN BY: Steve Orlando
ART BY: Artyom Trakhanov
PUBLISHER: Image Comics
PRICE: $2.99
RELEASE: March 19, 2014
Our history is one of a settled people. We grow up learning of the trails and tribulations that go with sailing to new lands and the choice to buck the status quo and follow a leader into a new and dangerous world that comes with it. So watching the Atlantian people go through the motions of such a journey provides an incredibly interesting lens on science fiction.
Aboard the Deliverer we’re treated to a more robust feature for the supporting characters. Civil unrest starts to spread. So naturally debates arise about the best course of action. On land Ukinnu follows Anshargal into the abyss. We’re treated to a whole host of dangers, and the relationships of the characters are deepened through survival.
Amongst all this Orlando takes time to focus on certain character beats that go a long way to expanding what we know about our leading men. Both Ukinnu and Ashargal have flashbacks. These sequences take place in a time long before we met them on the pages of issue #1. Each manages to take the respective character in a new and different direction while still informing what we knew about them previously. It serves to balance the pacing of the A and B stories perfectly.
Trakhanov’s art is still absolutely breathtaking. His colors wash over the panels in a way that emotionally compliments Orlando’s script. The colors are vibrant and engaging during the action scenes and literally make everything pop off the page. Stylistically the inserts used to break up large panels help convey the character’s feelings in hectic moments. While the flashbacks have their own style and tone. Everything in the execution shows a creative team that’s found its perfect groove.
What happens on these pages doesn’t throw the story forward with the same raging current of the first, however, the issue revels in smaller moments finding its focus on character and world building. The effort is solid throughout and manages to convey all sorts of unique information pertaining to this strange new world.
The relationships between the characters are now more complex and layered. Everyone’s motivations aren’t entirely clear and idealistic clash is very close on the horizon. For a book chock full of new ideas, it’s the old ones that prove most interesting in the second issue. A flawed but driven leader, an ambitious newcomer, and the dangers of being frontiersmen prove most engaging. These elements along with the exciting final page will have you dying of anticipation until April.
Rating 4.5/5 Skulls.
Comics
‘You’ll Never Leave This Place Alive’ – IDW Dark’s Next Horror Comic Will Make You Question Reality
Five friends. Four houses. One perfect life. Bloody Disgusting is excited to exclusively announce You’ll Never Leave This Place Alive, a brand new horror comic from IDW Dark.
From Eisner-Nominated writers Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly, and rising horror artist Heather Vaughan, You’ll Never Leave This Place Alive is described as a “paranoia-laced, socially-conscious, horror mystery that will leave you questioning reality, and reveal that this crafted world is more of a nightmare than the idealistic dream they were expecting.”
Phoebe Joplin has never questioned the world her parents built: a secluded community where she and her friends were raised to be smarter, stronger, and better than anyone else. No distractions. No dangers. No secrets. Until the night of their graduation.
When one of them dies under impossible circumstances, Phee starts to pull at the edges of her perfect life—and what she finds is something far more terrifying than she ever imagined.
Because this place isn’t a sanctuary. It’s a cage. And no one who discovers the truth ever leaves it alive.
Collin Kelly & Jackson Lanzing (Batman – One Bad Day: Clayface, Star Trek: The Last Starship) co-write the upcoming IDW Dark horror comic, featuring art by Heather Vaughan.
Jackson Lanzing said in a statement to Bloody Disgusting, “You’ll Never Leave This Place Alive is in many ways a spiritual successor to our last creator-owned horror, The Principles of Necromancy – a dive into the promise and consequence of playing god with the blood of innocents. But the Hivemind book this reminds me of most is Clayface: One Bad Day. This is a deeply human story with intensely raw emotions – five best friends and their five mysterious parents, tearing one another apart for the promise of some impossible glory that’s waiting just beyond their darkest actions. We’re thrilled to be bringing this story to life with our long-time partner in crime, editor Heather Antos, at IDW Dark – and we’re particularly excited to give our Clayface fans a new, brutal and emotional horror made just for them.”
Adds Collin Kelly, “We’re deconstructing a feeling that seems universal these days; our elders have a death grip on their power, without any intention of giving it up to the generations that come next. YNLTPA is about growing up with the limitless potential of the future… and realizing how much it’s a lie we’ve been fed to keep us under the yoke of the past. Bringing this brutal experience to life is our artist and co-creator, Heather Vaughan, who brings an incredible amount of humanity to our cast. But it’s in our youthful leads that Heather’s art really shines – you are going to fall in love with these young people, even as they go through the worst experience of their lives. What we’ve all crafted together is going to be tragic, painful, but above all else, sincere – with a future so uncertain, there’s only one thing we can trust: you’ll never leave this place alive.”
“Some horror stories are about monsters in the dark. YNLTPA is about realizing the monsters raised you,” previews Senior Group Editor Heather Antos. “Working with Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly on this series has been a dream in the darkest possible way. They’ve built a story that’s layered, brutal, and deeply emotional, and every issue gives artist Heather Vaughan opportunities to push the art into places that feel both haunting and deeply personal. Some horror comics will keep you up at night…this is one that will stick with you for years to come.”
The first issue of You’ll Never Leave This Place Alive goes on sale October 14, 2026! Make sure to pre-order at your local comic shop by September to guarantee a copy.
Exclusively check out the various covers for Issue #1 down below.
IDW Publishing’s horror imprint IDW DARK features comics like A Quiet Place: Storm Warning, Smile: For the Camera, The Exorcism at 1600 Penn, Beneath The Trees Where Nobody Sees, The Twilight Zone, Event Horizon: Dark Descent & Event Horizon: Inferno, and more.
You must be logged in to post a comment.