Nerds That Geek Comic Book Review - 'Wytches: Bad Egg'

Written by Joel T. Lewis

​One of the signs of a great comic book collaboration is the creative team’s ability to redefine a known quantity, to come at familiar material from a new angle. Thanks to generosity of the artist Jock, I was able to read an advance copy of just that sort of collaboration: Scott Snyder and Jock’s Wytches: Bad Egg.
 
The original Wytches series which began with Snyder and Jock’s not-so-subtle rejection of the traditional mythology of witches (the first two pages show the definition of witch as it appears in the dictionary on the first and then the same definition shredded by some unseen horror on the second) banked on their ability to reframe our understanding of a very commonplace figure of horror. The sales and wild popularity of that first 6-issue arc make a pretty good case for their having succeeded. The newly-minted creatures that Snyder termed ‘Wytches’ are far more sinister, mysterious, and interesting than the broom-striding hags whose more demonic origins (widely defined and subsequently criminalized by the publication of 1487’s Malleus Maleficarum, Latin for the ‘Hammer of Witches’) have in recent years faded into the background as witches have become more quaint figures of horror.
 
Bad Egg is an excellent continuation by way of prequel of the mythos of these twisted horrifying creatures. It also doubles down on the domestic tension between children of a certain age and parents whose cruelty is incalculable. I like to think that effective Horror is what happens when domestic tensions are monstrously manifested in the world. The notion that the smallest of humanity’s quibbles, those small-minded moments of rage, discontent, and frustration that are uniquely human, might be taken to a very dark place and become something truly horrifying. This is executed with startling familiarity in the interactions between parents and children in Bad Egg as adolescent insecurities about how one measures up to parental expectations are stretched to twisted and monstrous proportions.
 
Mirroring the first arc’s treatment of the classic witch myth, Jock manages to subvert the expectations of the first arc's twisted horrors cloaked in darkness by showing us those same creatures bathed in sunlight, and the effect is no less terrifying. Jock is a master of obscurity and horror through a kind of suburban strangeness and the pages that made the first arc of the series iconic, depicting chitt-chitttering blue and black heaps of tooth and claw and hunger echo and inform the art of this next chapter in new and vibrant ways. Jock’s figures’ features are starker and sharper than reality and the speckled appearance of colorful textures layered over the scenes of seemingly domestic calm build tension through the audience’s curiosity and awe.
 
Though my reading of this installment was definitely enhanced by the recent memory of Sailor Rooks’ discovery of what the Wytches were and what they were after in the first trade, Bad Egg is a great jumping on point for the world of Wytches, as it transitions from the domestic to the supernatural smoothly and swiftly within the first few pages. It recaptures the mystique and looming fear built up by the first 6 issues and tells a uniquely tense tale in the span of 80 pages. Bad Egg is a superb continuation of the unique brand of horror created when Scott Snyder and Jock collaborate and one that you will not be disappointed in picking up when it is released on Wednesday October 31st. Until Next Time, Geek On!
 
Special Thanks goes out to the Artist Jock who graciously provided Nerds That Geek with a Review Copy of Wytches: Bad Egg! 

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