HAHA #1

HaHa #1

Image Comics 2021

Written by W. Maxwell Prince

Illustrated by Vanesa Del Rey

Coloured by Chris O’Halloran

Lettered by Good Old Neon

HAHA is a genre-jumping, throat-lumping look at the sad, scary, hilarious life of those who get paid to play the fool—but these ain’t your typical jokers.

Prince revolutionised the world with Ice Cream Man and honestly He’s gone and done it again with HaHa! I have no idea what it is about taking a creepy trope like a clown and twisting into something that’s even more terrifying that he loves to do but he does it so damn well. I am not afraid of clowns, I never have been but after this who knows I may just find myself getting more and more creeped out by them. I will say though that the way this is being told is absolutely phenomenal to see. The opening is fantastic and it really captures the readers’ attention and their imagination as it draw them in and leaves them wanting to see so much more.

I love the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is perfectly presented. How the characters are introduced and then to see how they encounter the situations and circumstances really make this a much more gripping tale than I was expecting to see. The character development is pretty amazing and with the dialogue and how the are reacting to what happens fleshing them out even further we are starting to get a great look at the characters. The pacing is amazing and as it takes us through the pages revealing the story, the characters and the world our main guy lives in we are treated to one hell of a twisted tale.

The way that this story is being structured and how the layers within the story are emerging is just brilliantly done. How easily and eerily this mangesto draw the reader in and keep from looking away as the odd and weird begin to happen is seriously what I would have thought beyond human skill. How everything manages to work together to create the story’s ebb & flow is beautifully rendered. This story on it’s surface seems a little bit on the standard scale of horror but what Prince manages to do is completely flip the script and bring us something that I don’t think anyone else would be capable of.

Vanesa is a bloody genius is what I have say about that. The linework is utterly exquisite to see laid down and how the varying weights and techniques are being utilised to showcase this level of quality of detail is mesmerising. The sheer amount of creativity and imagination that we see within these pages is astonishing and amazing. The composition within the panels with the backgrounds and how we see the utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels shows off this stupendous eye for storytelling. The depth perception, sense of scale and the overall sense of size ands cope to the story is rendered phenomenally well. The colour work is divine! The choices of the colours we see and how the various hues and tones within them being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work show such a gorgeous eye for how colour works.

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There is a reason this has already sold out at the distributor level and is going back for another print, on the day it came out no less. That’s because this is smart, intelligent and downright phenomenal storytelling that utilised both words in visuals to bring to a place that can turn you into a Coulrophobe. So enter at your own risk, keep hands inside the ride at all times and buckle up for your safety.