Sleep #7 // Review
Chapter Eight runs for the first five pages of the issue. Chapter Nine is one page long. (So is Chapter Eleven.) Things are speeding-up now that Jon’s in a straitjacket in a massive cell. They’re looking after him...sort of. He’s concerned for his wellbeing. In theory Tabby is concerned for his wellbeing as well, but they won’t let her talk to him. (For the most part they don’t even acknowledge anything he’s saying.) Things are looking pretty bleak in Sleep #7. Writer/artist Zander Cannon begins to draw his horror/drama to a close as Jon is evidently being tested by people in lab coats.
Jon has no idea what day it is. There’s a tranquilizer dart in his leg that he’s able to get out with his teeth. He’s feeling pretty ulnerable, but the cell he’s in looks like it’s in pretty b ad condition too. It’s as sturdy as anything...three stories tall with an observation window on every level. He sees Tabby briefly appearing through one of those windows...so he knows she’s there. He’s asking to speak with her, but they’re nto responding. They’re treating Jon like he’s not even there. They don’t care about him. They only care about what he becomes when he falls asleep...
Cannon’s scripting leaves a lot of delicious ambiguity around the edges that the reader can explore with his or her own paranoia. There’s enough in the margins of the story to suggest a lot of elements of the plot which simply haven’t been introduced yet. It’s seven issues in and Cannon continues to guide the resader down a very shadowy path that could still lead in so many different directions. Typically if a series remains largely a mystery at seven issues in, it can start to feel kind of nebulous, but Cannon is doing a good job of keeping the reader engaged through all of the jarring cuts in the narration from chapter to chapter.
The drama of what Cannon is beinging to the page feels remarkably well-rendered. Without the ability to move around at all, Jon should be a bit more limited in his ability to express anything at all, but Cannon’s rendering of Jon’s lak of mobility amplifies the sense of vulnerability that is written in broad strokes across his face. There’s a sharp sense of despiration about it all that continues to be remarkably engaging.
Theoretically Cannon could keep going with te series indefinitely that way that he’s been rendering everything. The fact that it feels like this seven issues in is quite an accomplishment on his part. The quickening pace of the chapters DOES give the feeling that things could be ending soon. And the final issue IS scheduled to be the eighth, so there’s no questioning that he’s going to be concluding it next month. The challenge is going to lie in finding a way to end it that feels satisfying with there being as much mystery as there still is lurking around the edges of every panel.
