The family man (episodes 23, 24, 28-30, screenplay by Jamie Delano) - Penniless as often, John Constantine hitchhiked and gets deposited in Northampton where he visits Jehosaphat P. O'Flynn, an old knowledge, to enjoy his generosity. This gentleman is a merchant who has a shop that provides home and rare items, some of which prohibited by law. After solving the mystery of the threat O'Flynn, Constantine realizes that he has on this occasion facilitated the work of Sammy Morris (The Family Man), a serial killer preying relatives in the killing with a knife.
The first episode is an opportunity for Jamie Delano to have fun with the dark side of the works of fiction, with appearances from 7 dwarves in a bar, or a monkey man (Tarzan) in a park. It's nice to read without an analysis or a penetrating perspective on this form of literature. With the other 4 episodes, Delano dissects the most alienating aspects of parental obligations, and the vulnerability of children. Thomas Constantine (John's father) has a crucial role in this story. Delano also probe the psyche of John Constantine, and its propensity to make himself justice. The fight against Family Man becomes very personal and Constantine has the opportunity to shoot him in cold blood, without further ado. Delano manages to turn this moment into a complex reflection on the profound motivations of Constantine, but also on how the tool (by a firearm) changes the behavior of the individual. As usual, it turns a horror story into an instrument for examining lackluster corners of society and the human soul, in a suspense adult and twisted.
On one episode to another, drawings and inking is done by Dean Motter & Ron Tiner, Ron Tiner alone, Tiner Ron and Kevin Walker, Ron Tiner & Mark Buckingham. Each team uses a disjoint style with superhero comics, giving ordinary, everyday appearance to each individual. They transcribe all with conviction suburban scenery of this England of the middle class and poor neighborhoods, without exaggeration or dramatization. Depending on the teams, the reader may be a little confused by expressions of coarse faces or unpleasant aesthetic to the eye for the characters.
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Early warning (episodes 25 & 26, screenplay by Grant Morrison, drawings and inking David Lloyd) - John Constantine is deposited by a trucker Thursdyke, a small town hard hit by unemployment, which is experiencing a second wind thanks to the implementation of a nuclear research center nearby. Grant Morrison is flowing exceptional manner in the mold of Constantine stories to a story mixing fear of nuclear power, moribund community residents at bay before the inevitable poverty and renunciation of ideals (individuals working for the Nuclear while their inner convictions is that Nuclear inevitably leads to atomic annihilation). David Lloyd draws pages where the atmosphere of doom is cut with a knife, where the faces of the bodies and individuals are inhabited by their anxieties. 5 Stars.
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Hold me (Episode 27, screenplay by Neil Gaiman, drawings and inking Dave McKean) - John Constantine finds himself in a deprived area of London. At a party, he met Anthea, a responsible shelter for homeless. He accepts his invitation to go home. In the building lurks a spectrum that absorbs the vital energy of the people he meets.
Neil Gaiman invites the time of an episode in the pale and desperate world of John Constantine. He managed to make a plausible homeless individual with whom the reader can feel some empathy. He adds a lesbian who is not afraid of anything and develops the theme of the unbearable loneliness of the individual, in the form of a very dark fable. Dave McKean realizes more descriptive than usual designs, less conceptual, less loaded with associations of ideas through the juxtaposition of disparate images. The result is readable and convincing, even if it lacks the density stories of Jamie Delano. 4 stars.
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Mourning of the magician (Episode 31, screenplay by Jamie Delano, drawings and inking Sean Phillips) - A member of the family of John Constantine has swallowed his birth certificate, but its spectrum focused on Gemma Masters (niece John) and refuses to cease to haunt her (or his presence is traumatic). This is an opportunity to Delano to portray a father / son relationship, with particular emphasis on the awareness of the son (young adult) noting that his father took of age, has become old, n ' is what it was. Although not as horrific as the previous episodes, Delano puts again in a painful light of individual development when one becomes aware of the death of his parents and their aging. Sean Phillips takes an adult graphics, a little rough. Tom Ziuko put their heart with harsh colors and provocative for the sake of shocking, no real artistic intelligence. 4 stars.
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New Tricks (Episode 32, scenario Dick Foreman, drawings and inking Steve Pugh) - Seeking to clarify what happened to an acquaintance, John Constantine is confronted with a man-eating dog. Foreman overcomes the lack of Delano time of an episode for a story that is hard to take at face value, without smiling discovering this horror series B. The reader already smiled much less before the first degree drawings Steve Pugh who transcribes the horror viscerally, without taking glove, without distancing. Suddenly, it is much less easy to take with detachment the danger of this dog. A good horror story, less social and psychological as Delano, more direct. 4 stars.
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Sundays are different (Episode 33, screenplay by Jamie Delano, drawings and inking Dean Motter and Mark Pennington) - It is Sunday morning, and Constantine is in good spirits, full of confidence in the future. He meets up with Martin Peters (former manager of Mucous Membrane, the punk band of Constantine) who now calls Patrick McDonell. He became a real estate developer specializing in environmental goods.
This episode was in 1990, and Delano highlights profiteers ecological business. With his legendary cynicism, Constantine was quick to understand that behind this facade return to values of the land, it is "business as usual" (business is business). The designs are acceptable, sometimes successful, and Tom Ziuko put the soft pedal on its range of provocative colors. 5 stars for the scenario, 3 stars for the drawings.
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The Gangster, the whore, and the magician (text Jamie Delano, Tim Bradstreet illustrations) - Sonja is a girl from the east that ended in the hands of Frank Bufo pimp. It was responsible for an unusual mission: to collect samples of bodily fluids 5 John Constantine (blood, sweat, urine, semen and tears).
Bradstreet's illustrations are rather arbitrary and somewhat memorable. Delano in 2000 evokes the existence of trafficking in women in Eastern countries where a new Sonja tells his chilling and terrifying story to a John Constantine who has seen others. If the early fears of a text too flirting with pastiche and having too much difference with the subject, subsequently proves that Delano has a sense of the extent its effects. Without dwelling on the forfeiture of Sonja and degradations, he describes a life close to our totally ransacked, yet without that Sonja is reduced to a human wreck caricature. The story addresses all the sensitive points without wallowing in smelly voyeurism, or maudlin sentimentality. A new success in the assets of Delano. 5 stars (for the text, 1 star for the illustrations that do nothing).
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Most covers are painted by Kent Williams in a more traditional style than McKean, but with a strong emotional power.
Although composite, this volume contains real nuggets (the stories of Delano and Morrison) with illustrations ranging from beautiful (David Lloyd) very evocative of England at the time, but not always very flattering to faces. In The bogeyman (episodes 34-46), Jamie Delano yet written a few episodes and then it hands over to Garth Ennis.