Advance Review: Saint Chaos #2

Written by: Laura Hong-Tuason, CC2K Comics Editor

Simon Monroe and Honeycomb are back and they’re only getting started! If you haven’t read Saint Chaos #1, check out my review here. If you already have or are just curious about #2, proceed and be warned. It’s twisted!

Saint Chaos #2

Writer: Noah Dorsey
Illustrator: Zsombor Huszka

Dorsey and Huszka have done it again. They have successfully managed to creep me out once more, this time within the first three pages. It’s not a bad thing. It’s kind of an awful good thing as I sit here trying to brush off the crazy that is the villainous Honeycomb.

Let me explain. The first page opens up with silent panels of Honeycomb. The black and white penciling here is extraordinary—beautiful even, or at least as beautiful as they can be of a crazy sadistic murderer. Through actions alone, you can already get a good sense of who Honeycomb is. He’s gross. He’s insane. He’s unpredictable. And then talks, and everything you’ve conjured up in your mind rings true. Splash some red coloring on the pages and things get frighteningly real. I think I can speak for everyone and say that the hair on your arms will stand.

Now here’s the kicker: Honeycomb isn’t alone. For the most part he’s still his own boss, but something else is brewing in the background, bringing the story of Saint Chaos onto a whole new playing field. With only two more issues to go, I find it very ambitious of Dorsey. However, I revel in this new storyline. It brings forth more questions and I can’t wait for how it’ll all come together in the end.

But enough of Honeycomb, let’s move onto protagonist Simon Monroe. He’s not faring any better after striking a deal with Honeycomb, which involves Simon being killed at some point within the next 4 days. In this issue, he is still restless from not knowing who his mother’s murderer is. To distract himself, he figures he’ll do some good by convincing desperate, unfortunate people like himself to live their life instead of taking the easy way out. Or at least preventing them from being gruesomely killed at the hands of Honeycomb, who’s happy to do the deed.

And that is when Simon’s character gets complicated. I used “oxymoron” in my last article to describe Saint Chaos and I’m going to use it again. Simon is an oxymoron. A depressed guy who wants to die, he is willing to let Honeycomb kill him because he can’t do it himself. At the same time he knows how twisted Honeycomb is, so he’s hell bent on saving others from falling victim like he did. No one else, he thinks, deserves such a cruel fate. Yet despite all this, he justifies his actions by saying it’ll piss Honeycomb off and make Honeycomb kill him sooner. See? Complicated. In his own way, Simon’s just as insane as Honeycomb. I don’t know what Dorsey’s cooking up inside of Simon’s head but it’s getting good.

Alright, so there exists a story between Simon and Honeycomb, Simon and his mother, Honeycomb and who-knows-what, and wait for it—a cliffhanger at the end of this issue. What a tangled web of overlapping stories, right?

While issue #2 isn’t as thrilling as the first, it is still on the same level of grotesque, horror, and mystery. Overall, Saint Chaos will definitely overwhelm you, so give it a try. It’s only four issues!

Saint Chaos #2 is out soon and can be ordered from er-studios.com. For more information, follow @thenoahdorsey on Twitter for the latest updates.