This issue, with all its magic, ought to work. It’s about water nymphs and forest spirits and all sorts of earth magic and it just doesn’t work. The problem is Foreman and Thompson are too literal. Thompson even paints a full page but it doesn’t help.
Foreman opens with his dumb freelance reporter from the first issue, who doesn’t do anything but bookend the story. Then Sherilyn, the hooker with the heart of gold, considers leaving Black Orchid–who’s passed out most of the issue–and go back to the real world.
Throw in a rich Greek expat with a mansion in Tennessee and a sad flashback about his romance with a water nymph and there’s nothing else to the comic. Foreman’s coy about resolving the previous series; he’s also slacking on developing Black Orchid as a character.
Thompson’s handling of the lengthy flashback is charmless.
Orchid continues to underwhelm.
CREDITS
Acts of Faith; writer, Dick Foreman; penciller, Jill Thompson; inker, Stan Woch; colorists, George Freeman and Digital Chameleon; letterer, Clem Robins; editors, Julie Rottenberg and Lou Stathis; publisher, Vertigo.
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