★★★☆☆ – Worth a Read!
An admirable reimagining of the mythology of witches and witchcraft that’s not nearly as good as the hype might suggest.
Wytches is a highly anticipated limited series and marks writer Scott Snyder’s return to horror. This is clearly a personal project and the premise alone should garner some praise. What starts off as an eerie new series soon becomes less and less unnerving as more of the mystery is revealed and the titular beings are explained. Much of the story feels rushed and the payoff is ultimately unsatisfying.
Jock as an artist was never my cup of tea. Even the variant cover-art is far better suited for the series. I can appreciate the mixed media sensibilities of the colorist, using traditional watercolor and liquid acrylic composites in Photoshop and as a result the series does have a signature look but the biggest problem is the heavy handed application of the technique to the point where a lot of the artwork’s detail is lost in a mess of psychedelic colors. This also affects the sequential readability of the work and some pages are just unnecessarily confusing.
Thankfully, the book handles some heavy subjects like parenthood, anxiety, and depression that make up for the lack the scares. My recommendation for the series is solely based on the baffling number of people who seem to love this book and therefore a read might be worth the trouble.
Personal advice? Go read Snyder’s ‘American Vampire’ instead.