Writer/artist Jamal Campbell and letterer Ariana Maher take Zatanna on tour for an all-new six-issue series, and it’s every bit as fun as that sounds! I mentioned a little while back on the AIPT Comics Podcast that this was perhaps my most-anticipated comic of 2025, and this first issue does not disappoint. Campbell brings an elegantly chaotic energy to the book that makes it feel like we’re watching a magic show unfold before our very eyes. This creative team is clearly already using every trick at their disposal to make this an unforgettable experience befitting a character who can do just about anything with the right set of backwards words!
Campbell’s page layouts are a thing of beauty. They’re consistently inventive, allowing the characters to weave in and out of wild situations in a way that flows beautifully and is easy to follow. That’s no mean feat for a story that’s constantly showing us upwards of 10 spells per page. In many ways, it feels like Campbell has brought every big idea he’s ever had for a magic user and is throwing them all out there as quickly as possible. Heck, the first page looks like a classical storybook, then the next double-page spread takes us through some of the biggest moments in Zatanna’s history (allowing Campbell to draw even more superheroes, which is always a plus with an artist of this caliber), and then the rest of the issue a madcap tour of multiple genres and tones.
DC
In one of my favorite moments, Zatanna uses ASL to cast a spell when her mouth is bound. In another, we see Zatanna jumping into a number of alternate realities based on various films produced by the ghost at the center of the story. The page is broken into several panels, with each panel acting as its own little short story. It can be almost overwhelming at times, but mostly only in the sense that it makes you want to go back and re-read a page to get every last little visual gag and mystical quirk you might have glossed over the first time.
Meanwhile, Ariana Maher is clearly having a lot of fun contributing to the stark differences between these various realities. Beyond the visual signifiers of when Zatanna is casting a spell vs. her normal speaking pattern, the lettering adapts to whatever genre the characters find themselves in next. One of the highlights is a film noir reality where we switch to caption boxes with an old-timey typewriter font communicating a massive shift in tone. It’s very fun stuff.
DC
On the other hand, while the nonstop nature of the story is certainly very entertaining, I did find myself wishing that the issue could have taken a few moments to slow down, or at least that this first part was allowed to play out over a few extra issues. There’s so much here – like in the aforementioned “five set pieces in one page” — that I felt a few scenes were done a disservice by the refusal to take a breath. The book is extremely fun, but I don’t feel like I know anything about Zatanna’s crew, aside from the fact that they love her work and some of them may be a bit intimidated by her legendary status as both a performer and a Justice Leaguer.
But honestly, that’s a minor gripe. When the book feels like a carnival ride on the page and it still manages to deliver a final image that has me on the edge of my seat for next month, I’m not going to be terribly nit-picky. This is a miracle of a book for Zatanna fans, and I cannot wait to see where Campbell takes us next. Txen eussi, esaelp!
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