Comics already have DC and Marvel’s respective universes, the Massive-Verse over at Image, and even the burgeoning Underworld from Mad Cave.
But there’s one more you ought to know: the Murder-Verse.
At least that’s what I’m calling the series of books from writer Doug Wagner and artist Daniel Hillyard (and joined by colorist Michelle Madsen). Be it Plastic, Vinyl, Plush, or Plastic: Death and Dolls, the pair have created a veritable universe centered around socially-maladjusted weirdos killing their way to some kind of new self-truth/understanding. They may be deeply weird stories, each one caked in gallons of blood, but they’re also very much profound dissections of the human condition.
And now the duo are taking us to school.
Specifically, I Was A Fashion School Serial Killer follows Rennie Bethary, a young serial killer who skins her victim to create clothes. It’s an especially convenient M.O. as Rennie enrolls in “New York City’s most prestigious fashion school,” where she must contend with stressful assignments, catty students, and her “pesky, murderous urges.” And you thought grad school was bad?!
Art from I Was A Fashion School Serial Killer #1. Courtesy of Image Comics.
I mostly enjoy the works of Wagner and Hillyard because, even if the stories can feel a little one note-ish, they try to explore their leads with intent and determination. Death and Dolls, for instance, was a powerful exploration of Edwyn’s origins that gave us insight and still made our acceptance of this character a complicated process. In that way, Edwyn was made truly, deeply human.
And as far as more well-rounded protagonists go, Rennie already feels like a proper standout. She’s certainly more socially savvy and grounded (despite the tendency for murder), and we get the sense she’s trying to be a person amid the insanity. Even just one issue in, and Rennie feels like someone we can relate to more, and that makes the prospect of this deep moral introspection all the more entertaining and multifaceted. She’s almost Dexter Morgan-esque in her scope (if Dexter were an angsty goth fashion designer), and it’s nice to see Wagner and Hillyard branching out with their character choices and their respective emotional and intellectual makeup.
Art from I Was A Fashion School Serial Killer #1. Courtesy of Image Comics.
The larger point to address, then, is that this book does feel quite sitcom-y in scope, or like if you merged American Psycho with The Devil Wears Prada. To some extent, that approach is effective — it puts Rennie into contact with both Constance, a fashion school bully, and Sofie, who is an annoying but endearing friend candidate. And those two “roadblocks,” as it were, will be great in getting Rennie to make hard decisions about how much she values her dreams over her blood lust as well what happens when she’s forced to confront people she doesn’t want to make into, say, a sundress.
That very dynamic grounds her murderous ways in even more “realistic” confines, and we’re seeing someone fully struggle with their feelings and nature over, say, the sheer madness of an Edwyn. At the same time, the sitcom-ification cuts out some of the inherently peculiar undertones of the “Murder-Verse” — Wagner and Hillyard excel with really bizarre situations (see Plush), and something more “ordinary” may not allow for as much bonkers magic to help make this book truly flourish. But, again, it’s B+ at this point for dropping us into a new setting.
Art from I Was A Fashion School Serial Killer #1. Courtesy of Image Comics.
At the same time as a New York fashion school is a neat setting for this story, some of that initial promise isn’t seized upon visually. A Wagner-Hillyard story is always going to be pretty unwavering in its depiction of violence — we get a solid stabbing in the first few pages, by god. But in this book so far, it just feels a little…standard. Yes, the singular nature of these murderous depictions are still thematically important, but there’s so much new energy and intent infused in this setting, and we aren’t getting much new in terms of gore and violence. Even one part which shows Rennie’s, um, process for prepping her victims only feels initially exciting, and some of the magic and luster fades almost right away. Is it too safe? No. But is it overt and confrontational enough? Also no.
Still, there are some smaller visual elements that feel exciting in the early stages of Fashion School Serial Killer. For instance, close-ups of Rennie’s “human clothes” (like human bone hair chopsticks) are really effective in showing an intimacy that cuts deep. Meanwhile, her scratching, a physical manifestation of her mood and urges, is truly unnerving (and what the debut needed more of to truly flourish). These aspects humanize the violence and blood in a way that feels sharper than some of the pair’s “sibling” books, and they promise a proximity that demands engagement. The fact that it wasn’t joined by even grander acts of bloody murder just makes this debut feel like a nosebleed and not a gushing abdomen wound.
Art from I Was A Fashion School Serial Killer #1. Courtesy of Image Comics.
I walked away from issue #1 generally enjoying I Was A Fashion School Serial Killer. Rennie is going to be interesting to watch; there’s some great challenges and opportunities for her ahead; the more humanizing elements (the school, the sitcom-esque tone) are ready to put in work; and there’s these intriguing physical elements that demand your attention. Still, the book doesn’t land with the same heft as some other Wagner-Hillyard killer stories — either because there’s a little too much “newness” to this title for things to be sorted already and/or the team really can’t commit all the way quite yet.
Either way, there’s more that’s working than not, and with a little more pressure and stress, I think Rennie will be struggling between her two sides in a way that will feel massively familiar to most of us. We just need to let the tension simmer and give these elements a chance to commingle. But for now at least, the this title is growing in new and interesting ways — and at least it’s not Age of Ultron, right?
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