Sebastian Harlow rescues an angel, is killed as a result and is brought back from the dead. How will this affect his nihilistic outlook, and where did that outlook come from? Find out in Sins of the Black Flamingo #3 from Image Comics!

SINS OF THE BLACK FLAMINGO #3

Writer: Andrew Wheeler
Artist: Travis Moore
Colorist: Tamra Bonvillain
Letterer: Aditya Bidikar
Editor: Andy Khouri
Publisher: Image Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: August 24, 2022

Previously in Sins of the Black Flamingo: Sebastian Harlow rescues an angel from the clutches of Thorndike Scar. Harlow is not religious but being around the angel relieves his pain. Scar sends men after him, and Harlow tries to lie low and look for help. The thugs catch up with him, but Abel, the golem, is on the scene and knocks them out. Harlow asks Abel to take the angel to the local synagogue and sets up an encounter with Scar’s men at the sight of an abandoned zoo. He does have some abilities – he contacts the local spirits of the land and asks for their help. While he easily dispatches the thugs, he did not count on Scar arriving himself. Nor did he expect Scar to shoot him.

WHEN A LIFE IS WORTH SAVING

Sins of the Black Flamingo #3 opens with a scene of Abel’s father, in the past, thanking Harlow for saving his boy and mentioning that Abel also saved him. He makes the point that we should not consider this a debt and repayment; rather, that doing good is important because it is the right thing to do.

Harlow, who was shot in the chest last issue, comes to life in a tub full of liquid clay. Ofelia is there to hose him off, sarcastically welcome him back, and inform him that he was dead for three days. She seems peeved that, of all the people it could have been, he is the one who returned. Her place in the world is as one of the people who tries to fix things. She is cross because there are a lot of things that are not fixed because everyone else, deliberately or not, seems bent on making everything worse. His resurrection had a price.

He wants to know where the angel, Ezekiel, is. She tells him he is in the garden. After he leaves, she talks to the tub of clay, and it steps out and takes the form of Abel. Ofelia does not think Harlow deserved this, especially since this now ties them together. Abel was immortal; now if Harlow dies, he will die too.

Sebastian Harlow realizes it was his own fault that he died, but he has some trouble coming to grips with his resurrection. Ezekiel finds him. Harlow’s world is falling apart. The world he knows does not make sense if there are angels in it. Ezekiel’s existence puts the lie to everything he holds to be true. He asks why, if he is an angel, does he have a body that could get captured. Why did he come down to Earth? Ezekiel only remembers being bound, having his blood drained regularly – and Harlow being the first person who was kind to him. One thing leads to another, and they have an adult encounter.

That night, Harlow suits up for a break-in. He is breaking into his own house, which is a neat touch. He cannot simply go home because Scar’s men may be watching. He sneaks in a window and finds the place tossed. Being there triggers memories of Professor Hugo Tarn, who seduced him and introduced him to the occult. While Harlow was with him, he found the Devil’s Tooth and Tarn persuaded him to touch it. That is when he saw the darkness of the world, realized there was no God, and realized we are all doomed.

As he picks up the Devil’s Tooth, with a gloved hand, someone puts a pistol to his head. He recognizes Sebastian. Sebastian has no clue who he is. The guy says he does because he blocks him every time he makes a new profile. This rings a bell, and we get a delightfully pithy exchange. Then Sebastian tosses him the Tooth. The man touches it, becomes overwhelmed, and collapses. But he was not the only person looking for Harlow.

PAST INFORMS PRESENT

Sins of the Black Flamingo #3 does not have full frontal nudity, but there is definitely nudity and sex depicted. It is beautifully drawn, but this is a book with adult themes and moments. One of the things that balances out some of the sexiness is Ofelia at the beginning. We get the distinct sense that she is more than just a fiercely independent Black woman. She made a deal with Death, and she appears to be associated with the spirits of the land. For all that resurrection is rare and unusual, she casually waits, holding a hose at the ready, for Harlow to come back. To learn after this that the clay is Abel was awesome and makes sense of the opening scene.

Harlow wants the Devil’s Tooth as it may be a powerful enough artifact to break the collar that binds Ezekiel. I like seeing him in action as a burglar. He is dressed mostly in black, but I think the matching leopard-print gloves and athletic shoes are a perfect Black Flamingo touch. The flashback is an interesting way to spend a little more time on the heist and provide another important chunk of backstory. I like the exchange with the intruder, who is also a bit of a stalker. And thanks to the flashback, it sets up what happens when this guy gets a touch of the Tooth.

BOTTOM LINE: FROM OCCULT HEIST TO PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT

I like the way Sins of the Black Flamingo #3 deftly uses the occult as a way to introduce characters that appear related to religion and juxtapose them against a man who has been absolutely certain that there is no place for them in this world.

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