Department of Truth #9 // Review
Cole Turner was traumatized as a kid. One of the people responsible for that trauma is about to teach him something about magic in the darkness of ancient history as he learns more about his current employer in Department of Truth #9. Writer James Tynion IV continues his story of darkness in the shadows of society with the aid of artist Martin Simmonds. The series continues with a huge amount of backstory that doesn’t exactly interface with the comic book format all that well. Simmonds’ visuals work beautifully in the backgrounds of huge blocks of text in an issue that doesn’t attempt to do a whole lot with the comic book format.
As a kid, Cole Turner had been told that he had been traumatized by a baby-eating monster in his grade school. Kids are impressionable. There were people in the government looking to spin the reality of those stories to resonate into popular consciousness. Years later, one of the guys responsible for that operation shows up in Cole’s bed. He tells him of the story of magic and belief as the two of them deliver a few pieces of star-spangled luggage to an airport in Denver.
Tynion really wants to tell a story. Tynion really IS telling a story. In this issue, the story in question forms in the haziness of a ragged conversational tone. The monologue has its own weight and rhythm, but it lacks the kind of engagement with the visuals that would make for a compelling comic book. Tynion is hell-bent on telling the story of how magic fits together with a contemporary world where faith really DOES create truth. There isn’t time to find a way to fit it all together into a more engaging narrative, so he doesn’t bother. It’s too bad. This is an issue outlining a world of historical magic that identifies the main mystery character as Aleister Crowley’s Scarlet Woman. It should be a powerful moment. Instead, it feels a lot like a weighty exposition.
There may not be a whole lot of story in the issue, but there IS horror. Simmonds is able to draw some pretty stylish backdrops for that horror as Cole’s childhood in mutated Satanic panic strikes a suitably powerful cord. Aside from that much, the long road trip to Denver and conversations of magic get suitably occult-y backdrops with the same shadowy, resonant mood that Simmonds had graced so much of the earlier issues in this series with. It would be a lot more interesting to see what Simmonds might be able to do with a more integrated page and panel that wasn’t so bogged down in text. The symbolic surrealism behind those big blocks of text IS interesting, but it’s a format that’s starting to feel a bit dull nine issues in.
The world of magic in the universe of The Department of Truth should have had a deeper connection than the one that Tynion is managing here. As it is, the author seems to be going over basic lore about magic and occultism that could have been carved together off of Wikipedia. There isn’t enough to ground it firmly in the style and attitude of the series to make it feel all that integral to the story.
