Faithless II #4 is due out September 16, 2020. — **Faithless II #4** is due out September 16, 2020.

By Jacob Cordas — For the first time while reading Faithless, I was confused. It’s a comic that has a meticulously built story and world. Its influences are clear. Its references are well considered. This is clearly a labor of love, one that I have sincerely loved. But this issue makes an odd choice that I can’t understand.

As a warning the following will have spoilers.

From a narrative perspective the story isn’t hard to follow. It naturally grows out of what has come before for the majority of its page count. But then they introduce a new character, a man who strolls out from behind the Devil’s Door. Visual stress has been given in previous issues to this door knocker - so far it tracks.

Faith has a tourist adventure with the man. They wander the city and he explains the sites that she already knows. They end up on a hill at sunset. They make love. And still so far it tracks.

But then he reveals he’s a ghost, which in and of itself isn’t a bad choice. But the comic has consistently done two things in both volumes so far: 1) abstract out traditional monsters while still leaving in the occultism and 2) establish that Faith is at least partially (if not willfully) unaware of the degree of all that is around her.

In regards to the first point, having him reveal himself as a ghost in such stark terms breaks the established universe For a comic so steeped in mood and atmosphere having something so grounded and literal clashes against the world that has been built. This is a world where demons are ethereal, vampirism is abstract. But a ghost is a ghost? The metaphor that everything else was provided is gone now.

However that choice could’ve theoretically worked if not for Faith’s reaction. She responds with a nonchalance that has never been displayed before in the comic. Faith is often highly emotional in her responses, prone to equally internalizing and panicking. This, however, is a very casual response that doesn’t line up with who we understand the character to be.

She also has absolutely no practical experience with magic. The only major magical occurrence she is completely aware of is the nightmarish vision the witch cast on her. In response to that sequence, she spent a whole issue reeling from it, only able to seemingly move past it after everyone she ran into minimized it. The second issue centers around her being gaslit by everyone she knows in this foreign land to be comfortable because she can’t accept the magic.

So why is she comfortable accepting it here?

It feels like a rushed choice, the kind of moment they could’ve built towards with more time but instead was pushed in too early. There was a plan in place that they stuck to regardless of whether the plan was still accurate. If this had been allowed to breathe over multiple issues, this wouldn’t have been a problem. Instead it is glaring as we rush into the final two issues of this volume.

The rest of the issue is still great. There are even some small moments with the ghost that work extremely well if the greater context is ignored. The art is uniformly brilliant as always. Faithless II is an excellent series, but Faithless II #4 stumbles for the first time in the series.

Overall: Faithless II #4 is a solid comic that stumbles with its conclusion, rushing for a plot development that goes against the characters. 7/10

Review - Faithless II #4

Faithless II #4
Writer: Brian Azzarello
Artist: Maria Llovet
Publisher: BOOM! Studios
Price: $3.99
Faith gets screwed.
Release Date: September 16, 2020
Buy It Digitally: Faithless II #4

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My name is Jacob Cordas (@jacweasel) and I am not qualified to write this.