I’ve always enjoyed the books from Dark Horse Comics, especially the Alien and Predator book series with their weird cosmic futures and dystopian worlds. I haven’t found anything recently I’ve really latched onto, except the ridiculous Archie vs. Predator limited series, but with Weird Detective #1 I think I’ve found something really special. Like the other reviews I’ve written I’ll be trying to avoid spoilers in this review but I may have to touch on some.

From the cover you can tell this is going to be a very Lovecraftian book full of oddities and of course, detective drama. We start out meeting our protagonist Sebastian Greene, a very average cop turned super detective and full-fledged weirdo. The way he talks is very odd and is disconnected from the situation and the rest of his colleagues for a good reason, he’s Canadian, or at least that’s what he tells them. We find out that Sebastian isn’t of this world pretty quickly, but throughout the book he describes his own people in contrast to humans. Although Sebastian is a dry character he has great motivations and the fish out of water sense of the character makes for some funny scenes.

The writing for all the science-babble when Sebastian explains things to the audience is great and is easy to understand what they’re going for. Sebastian’s dialogue is excellent; A lack of mannerism’s and a total ignorance to his partners sarcasm really shows the reader Sebastian doesn’t quite understand the people of this world. The only part of the writing I didn’t care for was everyone else’s dialogue, the other detectives are stereotypical yet somewhat unbelievable. Overall I’d say Fred Van Lente’s writing is good, maybe the side characters and police shop talk will improve to create a slightly more immersive world. Also it seems no one has ever met a Canadian before, as a Canadian we might sound funny but were definitely not Lovecraftian, I promise.

The art in this book is fantastic, tons of rich purples and greens in the more supernatural parts of the book and rich vibrant colors bring life to world around Sebastian Greene. The detail throughout the book is excellent and the art itself draws you in and keeps you reading until the last page. The work of Guiu Vilanova, Mauricio Wallace and Josan Gonzalez comes together to make one of the best looking books I’ve seen from Dark Horse in recent years.

I really can’t wait for the next issue, I think I may have to look up some other books these talented creators have worked on. I read this issue a few times over, not because it’s confusing, but because it was simply that good. If you like Lovecraft or the supernatural, you’ll love this book and I highly recommend it.