Search For Hu #1

Search For Hu #1

Aftershock Comics 2021

Written by Jon Tsuei & Steve Orlando

Illustrated by Rubine

Coloured by DC Alonso

Lettered by Carlos M. Mangual

Aaron Tse lives for his family, and if he's not careful, he'll die for its secrets. When he left the military, Aaron Tse's first thought was providing for his aging parents. His parents' bar is experiencing hard times, and one night it’s shot to hell, with his parents critical-ly injured in the attack. But this was no ordinary robbery — Aaron's mother reveals that she fled China to escape a blood feud between the Jewish and Chinese sides of her family…both of which are powerful organized crime families. Peace existed between these two families — the Hu and the Margo-lis — but now it’s been broken, and Aaron must protect his parents from further violence. Aa-ron hops a plane to the homeland he never intended to explore, on a path to revenge he never wanted to walk.

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from this but I can guarantee you it wasn’t this and I absolutely adore this fact. One of the best things that we see is that Aaron’s mothers family fled Russia and went to China because of the way that Jews were persecuted in the Motherland. Having grown up Jewish and knowing that the Jewish people are pretty much everywhere and of every colour in the rainbow it shouldn’t have taken me by surprise but this isn’t something we see everyday so that originality and freshness isn’t lost on me.

I really like how this is eight told. The story & plot development we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceptionally well. The character development that we see through the dialogue, the character interaction as well as how they act and react to the situations and circumstances which they encounter. How we see this being structured and how the layers within the story emerge and grow is fantastic to see. It is within these layers that we learn so much information, get introduced to the characters and gets the story moving. All of this adds some great depth, dimension and complexity to the story as well. How we see everything working together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is impeccably achieved.

I love, love, love the interiors here. The linework is exquisite and how we see the varying weights and techniques being utilised to create this level & quality of detail work that we see throughout the issue is utterly bloody brilliant. The way we see backgrounds to expand and enhance the moments beautifully. How they work within the composition of the panels to bring out the depth perception, sense of scale and the overall sense of size and scope to the story is magnificently rendered. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a remarkably talented eye for storytelling. The various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work shows a brilliant eye for how colour works.

There are a myriad of reasons to really get into this and that Aaron is learning more about his family’s history, including that he’s an Asian Jew, his family is involved in sort of Hatfields vs. McCoy type blood feud over in China and having served in the U.S. Military all conspire to turn his world upside down. This adds so much intrigue, drama and just that extra oomph that you don’t expect to see. That this gets so involved in such a short amount of time is ridiculously good writing with phenomenal characterisation and these bloody fabulous interiors bringing it all to life. So much more than you bargained for that’s for damn sure.

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