Book: Blacksad: A Silent Hell (collected, translated volume 2), written by Juan Díaz Canales and illustrated by Juanjo Guarnido
Genre: Graphic Novels/Comics/Noir/Crime
Detective John Blacksad returns, with a new case that takes him to a 1950s New Orleans filled with hot jazz and cold-blooded murder! Hired to discover the fate of a celebrated pianist, Blacksad finds his most dangerous mystery yet in the midst of drugs, voodoo, the rollicking atmosphere of Mardi Gras, and the dark underbelly that it hides!
This is possibly Juanjo Guarnido’s finest artwork so far, following his black cat detective to sunny New Orleans and featuring a stunning Mardi Gras parade sequence.
However, the storytelling seems to fall flatter than the last collectio. Flashbacks are handled clumsily with almost no indication that we’re in a different timeline, and there’s less bite to the story: Blacksad has no personal connection to the people involved, and there’s less of the serious political themes of the last volume.
This collection contains one full issue of Blacksad, two two-page short stories, and a bucketload of notes from the artist about why he colours his panels the way he does. The art explanations are fun for a while, but I can only read so much about the comic’s art theory before getting tired of it. After the packed-to-the-brim first Blacksad collection this is a little disappointing, but perhaps that’s only because I was expecting another three collected issues.