While issue #1 of Zatanna: Bring Down the House focused on introducing readers to Zatanna and her world, this chapter takes a different turn. The groundwork was laid beforehand, and now, just like clockwork, issue #2 spends far more time exploring Zatanna’s relationship with her father. Zatara seems set to have been an omnipresent shadow over this miniseries, and in this issue, it becomes clearer why. Here, Mariko Tamaki and Javier Rodríguez deliver a far more eerie story than the one before.
DC Comics
Part of what has made the premise of this story so intriguing is that it takes a “Year One” tone with the character. This has made for an enjoyable modern depiction of how Zatanna, one of DC’s most powerful magicians, became to be. And to understand how Zatanna becomes that, this issue spends sometime in the past. Once, a terrible mistake was made, and someone disappeared because of it. But that wasn’t the end of the story. Seeing Zatara at his prime is incredible, his confidence and power ripple off the page. But so do other traits of his, his perfectionism, coldness, and intensity. The glimpses we see here help provide an understanding as to why Zatanna is both opposed to magic and getting involved in conflict.
DC Comics
While there is time spent on seeing the relationship between Zatanna and Zatara, the crux of the story is centralized on Zatanna being forced to assess her identity. Everyone expects her to be a great magician. The world may need her to become one, in fact. But it’s going to take a while, perhaps several more issues, for her to feel the same way. Tamaki uses this conflict to use an interesting story about identity. Isn’t it quite relatable, the world telling you to be something, while you feel like being another? While most of us haven’t had that identity clash over becoming a magician, it’s an all too familiar feeling. This creates an engaging narrative that feels easy to connect to on a reader level while showing how Zatanna has had to empower herself to combat the expectations of others.
DC Comics
Once again, Javier Rodríguez has his work cut out for him. This issue is very, very, eerie. Not to mention, there is a significantly different tone between the parts of the story carrying Zatanna’s memories and the present day. The most notable part of the issue is how colorful it is. Rodríguez uses a split style of coloring for the two narratives here, with the present day vibrant and sharp to contrast the past’s dry and faded coloring. In addition, the colors seem to parallel the emotions of the story, which helps to elevate the stakes of the situation Zatanna’s faced with. Additionally, Rodríguez does a spectacular job adding another level of intrigue to the mysterious magic casters who are introduced into the story. Right as Zatanna meets these casters, the art takes a dramatic shift and feels very similar to the title cards in Batman: The Animated Series, where the world feels bigger than even ours through an almost three-dimensional art style. That said, the story has beautiful art from cover to cover.
Zatanna: Bring Down the House #2 is a great follow-up to the first issue of this short miniseries. The premise continues to intrigue as new layers are added to the relationships of the characters, which seems to hint at possible implications on the future of the series. Additionally, the issue is an emotional knockout as it carries the burden of delivering a story about identity, and successfully delivers a relatable theme through this.
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