Comic Review: Terry Moore’s Rachel Rising: Night Cometh

As I was looking for photos and comic art pieces to feature in this article, I stumbled upon this upsetting news update from Terry Moore, writer and artist of Abstract Studio:

“Terry Moore Draws the Curtain on Rachel Rising” via ComicsBeat.com

If you’ve been following up on my reviews of the on-going series, my enthusiasm for each upcoming trade is slowly sinking into a depressive state. When I read the article, I actually started crying. Moore has been teasing his followers on Twitter with pencil drawings and Issue #42’s cover in color (which the series will end with), news of a possible omnibus, and the final tweet on January 25^th. 2016 showcased above.

What can I say? I’m slow on finding out “breaking news” stories. This is why I don’t follow authors on Twitter either because of major spoilers… #dontspoiltheendofrachelrisingformeplease

Night Cometh Summary (Some Spoilers)

Night Cometh – Volume #5 of the Rachel Rising series, encompasses Issues #25-30, begins with the town of Manson cleaning up Lilith’s mess of rats running through the sewers, rivers, homes…pretty much fishing for rats to either burn the carcasses or other ways of disposal. Not long after these few opening panels, Jet arrives in her corvette in the newly-melted streets in front of Rachel’s house.

Inside, Rachel is concocting an herbal-medicinal remedy for everyone’s scars, broken bones, and gashes while Zoe sits out in the backyard blowing up rats one by one with a firecracker.

“O Mortal, the grim reaper has harvested your field.”

Quoted by Sri Guru Granth Sahib, the central text of Sikhism, suits this issue (#25) for reasons not only cleaning up Lilith’s havoc, but healing, processing recent events, and new beginnings. Death still lingers within everyone involved. This next quote by Helene Cixous:

“Everything ends in flowers.”

The final issue on this trade—Issue #30—signifies new beginnings and the new mess Rachel gets herself into by the end. Out of all the cliffhangers Moore illustrates so far, I believe this is one of the weaker endings. I’m calling Issue #30 “the stuffer” due of the amount of information that is crammed in these few remaining pages, but I have to keep in mind that this is leading up to the remaining two trades, let alone the final twelve issues. Issue #30 isn’t the greatest, but it’s one of the most important readings post-Lilith.

Artwork

A quick discussion about artwork I recently read Strangers in Paradise: Pocket Book 1—a romantic-comedy/drama with ‘90s panels (Issue #1 was published in 1993) and the artwork was evident that it was a lighter read and the sketches were more “loose.” Night Cometh is the first Rachel Rising volume that began to showcase Moore’s earlier sketching techniques, but featured much more detailed panels than those I’m mentioning now. The one scene in particular is when Zoe is sitting on a street bench in the rain.

In Issue #26, there is a full-scale panel that showcased at San Diego Comic Con 2014. It’s beautifully illustrated as a flashback in various clusters and overlapping, with Rachel standing at the bottom on the panel clutching Jack.

Overall Review and Conclusion

In my past reviews, there hasn’t been much to cover in context with historical references to The Zohar (Cemetery Songs) or Jack the Ripper (Winter Graves). With Night Cometh, Moore has moved on to new story lines and keeping followers intrigued with characters, such as Malus, Detective Corpell, and Carol.

Each issue has their highlights, and to avoid spoilers, this is leading up to the next major story line. One reader on Amazon stated, “Moore’s series, which started so promisingly, seems to have lost its way, meandering around the edges of the plot rather than getting to it.”

The arguments were that injuries and deaths that take place are no longer taken seriously and we question what the stakes are.

Unfortunately, this reader is going to be missing a lot if they did not continue with the series. As previously stated, this is one of the weaker volumes, but it’s a stuffer. When receiving my undergrad, I was asked to write scripts. No themes, anything that came to mind. So I decided to write a script based on a gossip-session I had with a friend. It was my weakest film. A small glimpse into my life and it was boring. Granted, I was starting out with screenwriting and storytelling combined, and the entire story could have been reworked in order to seem somewhat interesting, but that is what Night Cometh is. It’s a small fragment of these character’s lives that we’ve been following. Even soap operas have their dull moments.