Alex Underwood is the new bearer of the Witchblade…  and now she’s a target for everyone who would have it for themselves.  Your Major Spoilers review of Witchblade #9 awaits!

WITCHBLADE #9

Writer: Caitlin Kittredge
Artist: Roberta Ingranata
Colorist: Bryan Valenz
Letterer: Troy Peteri
Editor: Eric Stephenson
Publisher: Top Cow/Image Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: November 7, 2018

Previously in Witchblade: While Alex and an unlikely ally try to get inside N-GEN, Johnny’s mysterious employer, Alex must also deal with the fallout of Legion’s demise as a host of demons vie for supremacy in NYC…

GETS A LITTLE BLOODY

We open with a crime scene, a bloody mess in the 78th precinct created by some sort of supernatural creature who happens to be a beautiful woman in Valentino couture.  When one of the surviving cops confronts her, she explains that she is different from Legion (who apparently is a previous monster defeated by the Witchblade?) and murders the woman in cold blood.  Meanwhile, Alex is confronted at her home by multiple people carrying guns and apparently demonically-powered?  It’s not really all that clear.  Nonetheless, the rest of the issue features confrontation after confrontation, with the various players stating their positions, ending with Alex in the custody of NGEN and her friends rallying to save her.

THE BLEEDING EYES FELT LIKE A BIT MUCH

All in all, there are a lot of things to like in this issue: The new look for the Witchblade is pretty dynamic, and makes a lot more sense than previous armored iterations.  The idea of a mystical gang war is an interesting one, and there’s always fun to be had with hyper-violent, bloody clashes of the sort we see here.  But as someone who hasn’t been following the first arc of the series, I had a lot of trouble following the story.  Another thing that didn’t help were repeated balloon placement issues, where the art forced dialogue from a person NOT EVEN ON PANEL to appear in strange and confusing places.  The art, while evocative and dark, suffers a bit from scratchiness and there are a couple of characters whom I couldn’t tell apart from page to page and panel to panel.

BOTTOM LINE: KIND OF CONFUSING

Even with those issues following what is going on, there’s potential in the story and in Alex, the new Witchblade, and I do want to see how this all shakes out in the long run.  Witchblade #9 is interesting, even with a few flaws that reduce my enjoyment of the story, with art that’s more okay than not, earning 2 out of 5 stars overall.  I hope this new Witchblade and her creative team get to work out all the kinks, because I think that they’re on to something narratively, it’s just not quite clicking yet…