The Many Deaths of Laila Starr #2 // Review
Death has become mortal. She's got a new name. She failed to kill the baby who would go on to invent immortality. Then she died. Now she's back, and the child is eight years old. She can save her job if she does the unthinkable. Instead, she's hanging out with a talking crow in the second issue of The Many Deaths of Laila Starr. Writer Ram V gets whimsically bittersweet in a very emotionally engaging chapter in the life of Death. The story makes it to the page courtesy of artist Filipe Andrade. With the rhythm of the series beginning to assert itself, Ram V's story is beginning to take on a pleasantly dreamy quality.
Death's name is Laila. She's just come back from the dead. A crow is hanging out with her. At first, it's a little reluctant to say very much to her. (It didn't think humans could talk.) As it turns out, the crow in question is a funeral crow. It carried off the souls of the dead when people offer it rice. Meanwhile, little Darius is eight years old now. The kid who will grow up to one day invent immortality becomes acquainted with his first loss. Then Laila dies. Again.
Ram V's whimsical darkness is deliciously off-center. The second chapter checks in with a child almost a decade after his birth. The story that Ram V tells of little Darius has a great emotional gravity to it, but Laila remains the center of the story. To his credit, Ram V has decided that all-powerful Death will be learning things about everything mortal. This time she learns a little something from a funeral crow who talks to her like an equal. It has its job. She had hers. There's a great sense of balance about it.
Once again, Andrade has beautiful establishing shots of massive cities and remote locations alike. The drama of little Darius is rendered for the page with a sense of wonder. A crow is made to look impossibly cute without the slightest bit of anthropomorphization aside from an occasional dialogue box. Laila has a conflict with the water that is positively gorgeous. It's an adventure that resides confidently and placidly on the page, thanks to a solid sense of mastery on the part of Andrade. So often, the fantasy of any world can feel like it's trying too hard to be impressive in any comic. Andrade makes the supernatural all feel so...natural.
Laila experiences two deaths in two issues. The years pass, and she returns. The title feels confident enough to suggest that this is likely to be a regular occurrence, possibly at the end of every issue. There's a poetic feeling of myth and magic about the episodic plot's structure that Ram V is working with, aided as he is by some very dreamy visuals brought to the page by Andrade. With the second of five issues, the series is roughly 40% finished. Already it feels like it's moving too fast. It's been such a pleasure so far.
