New horror comic DAMN THEM ALL is on its way from the genius talents behind The Walking Dead and Hellblazer, marrying the razor-sharp wit of John Constantine with the artistic talent that dominated zombie fiction at its height. In this case, however, the story will see a streetwise magician take on not the undead, but a wide array of awe-inspiring demonic entities.
DAMN THEM ALL is coming from BOOM! Studios, with writing duties from Eisner Award-nominee Simon 'Si' Spurrier, (X-Men, Star Wars, Hellblazer) and art from Charlie Adlard (The Walking Dead, X-Files, Judge Dredd), holder of the Sergio Aragonés International Award for Excellence in Comic Art. Spurrier and Adlard will be joined by colorist Sofie Dodgson (Bitter Root) and letterer Jim Campbell (All-New Firefly) for an all-star team with a comics pedigree few can match.
DAMN THEM ALL follows Ellie 'Bloody El' Hawthorne, who brands herself as an 'occultist-for-hire.' When Ellie's magician uncle passes away, the 72 devils of the Ars Goetia escape into the world, and she's left with the job of tracking them down and sending them back to hell using an arsenal of weapons, from holy water to a well-placed hammer. Coming October, the series will be available from physical and digital comic stores. Enjoy a preview of the first issue below, in which Bloody El has her first experience with the supernatural. The issue's main cover is by Adlard, with variant covers from DANI (Arkham City), Christian Ward (Dune: House Atreides), Sean Phillips (Criminal), and more.
From the preview, it seems that DAMN THEM ALL will answer the prayers of those who felt Spurrier's superlative run on Hellblazer ended too quickly - a group which includes Spurrier himself. Spurrier decried DC's cancellation of the series in an intense 2020 blog post, however - given the focus on a working-class British mage - it's possible many of the ideas that didn't make it into Hellblazer will now return in thrilling new forms. Indeed, Spurrier's Hellblazer was infused with rage at injustice and the abuse of power, and his comments on DAMN THEM ALL suggest the new horror series will carry this torch deeper and darker than DC's series:
DAMN THEM ALL is the right project at the right time. A series mixing crime and occultism, it's the perfect fusion of Charlie’s peerless storytelling and my own ghastly preoccupations. It's hard boiled, it's clever, it's bleakly funny, but above all it's angry to its core. Angry at the world, at the injustice, at the £$%#s who run the show, and ultimately at the creator responsible for this utterly imperfect creation. This is a book about demons, in which - spoilers - the demons aren't the bad guys.
Spurrier clearly still has more than enough fire to revisit the theme of an everyday conjurer reckoning with the truly powerful, and Adlard's art is at an all-time best, especially with Dodgson's already thrilling colors and Campbell meeting the challenge of communicating demonic intent through lettering alone. The Walking Dead famously used black and white to get away with more gore than publishers would usually allow, but it seems that even with a more ambitious palette, Adlard won't be holding anything back, stating:
I’ve wanted to work with BOOM! for ages… And I’ve wanted to work with Si for ages… Then the planets aligned and the perfect partnership was formed. With the perfect book. DAMN THEM ALL is everything I want a comic book to be. Intense. Atmospheric. Brutal. Horrific. And, above all, a mighty fine read!
With this creative team, DAMN THEM ALL will be a must-read for anyone even slightly interested in comic horror or crime, guaranteeing an acidic sense of rebellion and demonic sights not available anywhere else on the shelves. For fans of The Walking Dead and Hellblazer, October 2022's release of DAMN THEM ALL can't come soon enough.