An investigative journalist, who happens to be a deer, finds himself wrapped up in a conspiracy that is far deadlier than he could’ve imagined.  Your Major Spoilers review of Deer Editor #1, awaits!

DEER EDITOR #1

Writer: Ryan K. Lindsay
Artist: Sami Kivela
Colorist: Lauren Affe
Letterer: Jim Campbell
Editor: Dan Hill and Chas! Pangburn
Publisher: Mad Cave Studios
Cover Price: $4.99
Release Date: January 10th, 2024

Previously in Deer Editor: A John Doe slaying lures a journalist into a world of political intrigue, a wi-fi-enabled grotto, and a station locker full of secrets. For Bucky, an editor of the crime beat at “The Truth,” it’s all in a day’s work.

ALL THE WAY TO THE TOP

Deer Editor #1 kicks off with Bucky visiting a coroner who is examining a body.  The cops have brushed the death away, but some suspicious clues on the body, including a key and a matchbook, leads Bucky to dig deeper.  Going to the bar whose name was on the matchbook, he learns that the deceased man was there the previous night, speaking to a woman.  Bucky learns the woman’s name and then goes to her apartment to find her already dead.  He then discovers a pair of men who have arrived on the scene, he tries to catch them, but they get away.  After some more digging, a few more run-ins with the two men, and a visit to a brothel, Bucky is able to put everything together and realizes the mayor is deeply involved in a conspiracy.  He then goes to confront the mayor in public and afterwards leaves, realizing that things go far deeper.

A PACING NIGHTMARE

Deer Editor #1 really wants to be a great noir-style story, but it just doesn’t do enough to differentiate itself from the cliches and tropes of the genre.  The dialog is especially guilty of this.  Every conversation is packed to the gills with one-liners, quips, and sarcasm.  It often time feels like the characters are simply trying to one-up each other and nothing constructive is actually achieved.  This leads to the next problem this issue has, which is how convenient everything feels.  With the dialog not helping push the plot along, the pacing relies on strange coincidences, things happening without explanation, and Bucky just sort of figuring things out without the issue bothering to show how he put it all together.  A lot of these problems stem from how oddly paced this issue is.  Action jumps from one scene to the next to the next to the next, without much time given to really explain what the significance of the scene was.  In the course of 28 pages this story goes from investigating a dead John Doe, to implicating the entire city government in a conspiracy, with the possibility of some unknown threat hovering above everything, with Bucky being attacked no less than five times,  Also, while I wouldn’t normally compare this to a title like Blacksad, the solicitation name dropped it so it’s fair game.  The decision to make the main character a deer feels like a shallow decision based solely on the punny title.  Blacksad utilizes its animal characters in ways that play off the reader’s preconceived notions about animals to both subvert expectations and as shorthand, Deer Editor #1, does none of that.  The fact that the main character is a deer has very little impact on anything.

THE SAVING GRACE

While the writing in Deer Editor #1 leaves a lot to be desired, the art manages to come in and keep this from being a total loss.  The look is appropriately moody and bucks the trend of noir comics by being mostly light colored without a lot of shading.  This gives everything a much starker and more barren look that gives the world that this title takes place in, an almost nihilistic feel.  There is a strange decision though to give Bucky normal deer hooves but have them act like human hands, which leads to some uncomfortable contorting of “fingers” whenever he’s holding something.

BOTTOM LINE:  A CLICHED AND POORLY PACED TALE

Deer Editor #1 just simply doesn’t do anything to set itself out from the crowd, instead it relies on the strange nature of its main character, which is mostly a thing without any depth.  The mystery itself is not all that interesting and the way Bucky moves through it is rushed and unsatisfying.  Some well executed art is nice to see but doesn’t do enough to save this issue. 2 out of 5.

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Deer Editor #1

25%

25%

Maybe Let This One Go

Deer Editor #1 is a noir story that feels like a color by numbers painting. It brings nothing new to the genre and itself is not executed well.

• Writing

  1
• Art

  3
• Coloring

  3.5
• User Ratings (8 Votes)
  6.8