Silver Coin #11 // Review
Jean really wants business to pick up at the Wamburger. No one seems to be coming in. The guy in the kitchen isn’t doing very much, and her waitress Betsy is sitting around reading Stephen King. Not a whole lot going on. She needs paying customers. She’s going to get more than she asks for when a certain tip finds her business the subject of Silver Coin #11. Writer James Tynion IV brings a dark diner to life with the aid of artist Michael Walsh. Toni Marie Griffin assists with the colors. There’s a swiftness to Tynion’s darkness that finds just the right moment to strike in a satisfying horror.
A stranger leaves a bit of a tip. Betsy is a bit too lost in Carrie to pick it up. Jean spots a strange coin in the tip and idly wishes that more people would come in hungry for more than a cup of coffee. The next day the stranger is sitting on a bench across the street, taking notes as a long line has formed waiting for the diner to open. All seems well, but there’s something strange about it. The diner is packed. No one has left. They just keep ordering things. It’s not long before the kitchen runs out of meat.
Tynion’s pacing of the story does a very clever job of making it interesting. The title on the cover makes it perfectly clear that the cursed coin is going to show up, so Tynion spends a little bit of time establishing the three central characters. The wish is made, and the coin goes to work. Things are going to get ugly. It’s only a matter of time. The central conflict crawls into view in the midst of smartly subtle characterization. Each character’s personality comes across with striking clarity in spite of the fact that there simply isn’t a whole lot of time with them before things start to get ugly.
Walsh’s art shows a clever sense of movement. The feeling of a dead diner at the beginning of the issue allows Jean and her cigarette to share a moment with Betsy that establishes the basic atmosphere of the Wamburger with a striking line economy. Walsh is wise not to bog the page down in extraneous details. The washed-out colors that Griffin aids in are a hush on the page, guiding everything into the darkness. The white borders and gutters of the first half of the issue give way to blackness around every panel in the second half when the curse strikes.
The issue features the first part of a backup story called “Dark Passage” by Adam Gorham that adds a little bit of a dark kick at the end of the issue. Tynion’s main story also continues with a sinister turn for the coin in question. Thus far, all of the stories have had a stand-alone feel about them. Tynion appealingly coaxes the coin into a larger narrative framework as the series reaches its 12th issue.
