John Constantine, Hellblazer: Dead in America #2 from Si Spurrier and Aaron Campbell continues a very exciting trend from the first, in that it tackles the lengthy history of John Constantine and The Sandman Universe with an “everything happened” mentality. There are references here dating back to Rick Veitch’s run on Swamp Thing and Neil Gaiman’s Sandman, and thankfully, they fulfill a greater purpose than mere fan service. Si Spurrier understands that you don’t just namedrop the Kindly Ones for no reason. Threads from years ago loop back around to today, strengthening the storyline of Dead in America by rooting it in years and years of conflicts and team-ups between John and Alec Holland.
Swamp Thing isn’t quite the creature we once knew. His ecosystem has been ravaged by time and the “advancements” of modern society, to the point where he’s lost his sense of identity. The same could be said for the U.S. itself, which feels strangely unfamiliar and unnavigable for John. He’s been gone for too long.
It’s unclear if Levi Kamei has become Swamp Thing in this continuity just yet, but the fact that this is basically issue #14 of a series that was discontinued back in 2021 leads me to believe that he has not. That being said, I’d love to see what this creative team might do with a Levi/Constantine story. Campbell slides in some interesting visual cues here and there that also seem hint at the future of Alec Holland, the Parliament of Trees, and the struggle against the Gears that is yet to come. Again, it’s this approach of treating every story with some level of reverence that I greatly appreciate as a fan.
DC Comics
This series also revisits a tried-and-true element of classic Hellblazer storytelling: Not every monster is supernatural. As the opening of this issue reminds us, some the most terrifying stories in history have the most mundane explanations. So much of our fiction was created as a means to cope with one atrocity to another, from racial injustice to acts of sexual violence. A large subsection of folklore exists to dress up human evil as something beyond our reckoning, just because it makes it easier to process.
And then there’s John Constantine, a character who thrives in the gray area between outright lies, his carefully constructed reputation, and the bitter truth. He uses these bits of confusion to keep himself moving forward, even when none of his companions trust him and his own body is failing him. It’s always fascinating seeing John interact with an old acquaintance, because you know they must be a real piece of work themselves if they’re still alive, and Clarice is no different. I’m looking forward to learning more about this character, a mythological figure who has lived for so long that concepts of simple morality don’t seem to make much sense to her anymore.
This does feel very much like a middle chapter of a longer arc here, and so there are some scenes of the various pieces being put into place or the characters reminding one another of the stakes. At this early point, it’s difficult to tell where these various threads are leading, but I’m fully along for the ride on this new American Gothic tour. The visuals are terrifically unsettling, the characterization and use of mythology mixed with ugly real-world history is brilliant, and John Constantine himself is clearly ready to fall further than he ever has.
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