Like I said two weeks ago, there's a tug of war between what fits and what looks cool when it comes to picking splash pages. With WildCATS version 3.0, I went for cool. With Wicked Things, where there was only one full-page splash, but the main character was barely visible in it, I went for more representative.
So, Wicked Things. Coming off the conclusion of Giant Days the year before, the Allison/Sarin/Cogar/Campbell team produced a 6-issue mini-series focused on Charlotte "Lotte" Grote (who once described herself as 'Esther concentrated'), the younger sister of one of Esther's friends, and in the running for Teen Detective of the Year (age 16-18). Lotte finds herself accused of attempted murder of one of the other nominees at the awards banquet.
While her friend and sidekick Claire tries to find the real killer, Lotte is granted the "honor" of helping the London police. In practice, this involves fetching coffee, being forced to wear an ankle bracelet, and having her insights largely ignored. Do these cops not watch TV? The quirky smart-asses are always unsurpassed geniuses! Yeah, the cops don't know she's innocent like we do, but knowing this does not make me any more inclined to care about them. I greatly enjoy her smug needling of the cops who didn't listen to her until it was too late.
I like the people Lotte shares housing with a bit better, although we only really get to know one of them. But other than Lotte and Claire, there aren't many characters in the six issues that are very likeable. Probably because this is a murder mystery, and most of the other characters are potential killers. It's the grand tradition followed in all those British detective series my dad loves so much of giving the audience as many people they wouldn't mind seeing sent to the gallows as possible.
The humor is a mixture of Allison's knack for finding the absurd in otherwise mundane situations (such as one of the older cops failing at social media when trying to track down the people who stole a bunch of new phones) and Sarin's expressive art. Lotte, much like Esther, is a very dramatic character. She talks with her body a lot, and Sarin's great at capturing her dejection, glee and irritation.
While Lotte does help the cops with a string of casino robberies, and is eventually cleared of the murder, the true culprit is left unknown. I'm pretty sure Allison has continued the comic online, handling writing and art chores, but you know I'm not big on reading comics online. Maybe there'll be another trade, like we've gotten for Steeple.
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