Innovation is key in comics, or else you risk losing an audience seeking new ideas. Enter IDW Crime, a new label from IDW Publishing after their successful launch of IDW Dark. First up in the line of crime comics is Seven Wives, and its premise alone should have you licking your lips for more: 49 witnesses, seven wives, and one dead husband. Mixing religion, dicey social relationships, and two detectives with their own baggage, can IDW come out swinging with their new imprint?
A few key tenets of crime fiction, at least in my mind, include:
- A compelling central question: Not just who did it, but how could this ever happen?
- Clues that allow the reader to attempt to solve it.
- Twists that feel earned.
- Strong character motives, so much so that the mystery lives in the people.
- New revelations should escalate and complicate the mystery.
- A unique or at least strong setting is key.
After putting down my advance copy of Seven Wives, it’s fair to say the first issue has all of these, which is a testament to the new line at IDW taking crime fiction seriously, and to writer Zoe Tunnell’s plotting out your next favorite murder mystery.
The issue opens with the murder, delivered in close-ups to make it tricky to see who committed the atrocity. It’s a necessary moment, establishing that a death did take place, and it took place in a church! Early on, detectives are established, some odd behavior mixes things up from some folks who knew the departed, and away we go piecing together the clues.
Adding to the mystery is the larger cast, specifically seven wives. We’ve seen it work well with the Knives Out franchise, and it continues to work well here. That means individual points of view taken by detectives, different levels of comfort in a shared marriage, and mistakes in how things are recounted that will prick up your ears.
An extra-sized issue, by the time you near the end, you’ll have ideas on clues, only for the issue to drop a twist into your lap. What it means for the murder, the detectives’ ongoing work, and how this could change who speaks out adds a tantalizing element. Throw in the fact that the main detective has her own secrets, or secret past, and you have yourself a mystery nut worth cracking.
Art is by V. Gagnon and Maria Keane with colors by Antonio Del Hoyo, who add a cartoonish vibe to the characters. Their facial expressions and the world around them feel realistic, but their general look is a little loud, particularly the eyes. Don’t worry, though – when violence occurs, it feels harsh, like in a good horror movie. Colors by Tesslyn Bergin-Dicoi add a realistic, natural feel, with a striking use of pinks and reds in flashbacks that make them stand out. Layouts generally mix things up nicely, keeping your eye darting around as if even the art’s layout holds secrets.
The art never gets splashy, instead keeping things tight and in control. This helps you home in on clues and character, but the book decidedly lacks action, which makes sense given the genre. Because of this, I did find myself losing my interest during the second flashback. The interest picked back up eventually, though.
Seven Wives #1 delivers exactly what a crime debut should: a gripping premise, a web of compelling suspects, and a mystery that respects the reader’s intelligence. Zoe Tunnell’s script checks all the right boxes, building a case that grows more complex with each scene while planting clues that reward close attention. The art team reinforces that tension with expressive characters and purposeful layouts, even if the pacing occasionally stalls. By the final pages, the book leaves you with more questions than answers in the best way possible, setting up a series that feels confident, calculated, and worth following closely.
