Sunday, April 22, 2018

Review: REGRESSION #1

REGRESSION No. 1
IMAGE COMICS – @ImageComics

[This review was originally posted on Patreon.]

STORY: Cullen Bunn
ARTIST: Danny Luckert
COLORS: Marie Enger
LETTERS: Marie Enger
COVER: Danny Luckert
VARIANT COVERS: Danny Luckert (Spawn Month variant covers)
28pp, Color, $2.99 U.S. (May 2017)

Rated M / Mature

Regression is a new comic book from writer Cullen Bunn, artist Danny Luckert, and colorist-letterer Marie Enger.  The series focuses on a young man whose nightmarish hallucinations are complicated by the very thing that was supposed to help him.

Regression #1 introduces Adrian, a young man who is having a bad time at a happening backyard party.  Even this good time cannot stop Adrian from receiving a visit from the ghastly waking nightmares that plague his daily life.  His (girl)friend Molly suggests once again that her friend, Sid Ferrel, a hypnotist and comedian, can help him.  Sid, in turn, suggests past life regression hypnotherapy, to which Adrian reluctantly agrees, which may only make things worse.

I am familiar with Cullen Bunn's comic book work through the superhero and Star Wars comic books he writes for Marvel Comics.  I have not read Haunted, which Danny Luckert draws, nor have I read Marie Enger's titles, Pistolwhip or 2 Sisters.  After reading Regression #1, I may consider adding some of those titles to my already-too-packed reading list.

But Regression is worth a spot on the horror comic book fan's reading list.  It is like nothing else that I have read.  My only past experience with “past life regression” (a form of hypnosis which can supposedly recover memories of a person's past or of a past life or incarnation) is the 1999 David Koepp film, Stir of Echoes (based upon Richard Matheson's novel, A Stir of Echoes), which was really not about past life regression, although I associate the film with that.

Stir of Echoes had a deep sense of the mysterious, and I think that is what attracts me to Regression #1.  It is intriguing, creepy, and gruesome, but the first issue makes me ask questions (Who is that guy?  What is that? What's going on?, etc) to which I want answers... at least for the time being.  Regression is a mystery, and I want to play detective-reader enough to want to read at least a few more issues.  The first issue is also interesting enough for me to recommend it to readers.

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"


The text is copyright © 2017 Leroy Douresseaux. All Rights Reserved. Contact this blog for reprint and syndication rights and fees.

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