Outer Darkness/Chew #1
- WRITER
- John Layman
- Artist
- Rob Guillory, Afu Chan
- Letterer
- Pat Brosseau, John Layman
- Cover Artist
- Afu Chan, Rob Guillory
- Publisher
- Skybound, Image Comics
- Price
- 3.99
- Release Date
- 2020-03-04
- Colorist
- Afu Chan, Rob Guillory
The critically acclaimed, fan-favorite Image Comics series Chew is back for a sci-fi, time-displaced crossover miniseries with co-creator John Layman's current Image/Skybound Entertainment series Outer Darkness. The plot brings Chew protagonists Tony Chu and John Colby into the distant future of Skybound's sci-fi horror story. And while Chew may have concluded nearly four years ago, Layman settles back into the voices and world of the previous series while blending them effortlessly and effectively with the setting and cast of his current series despite the seeming disparities in tone and premise.
When the crew of the spacefaring ship The Charon need a special kind of culinary experiment after a key diplomatic mission goes wrong, the ensemble turns centuries into the past to snatch Tony Chu and John Colby from their own adventures in the middle of Layman and Rob Guillory's wacky crime series. What results is a madcap meeting of minds as Tony and Colby find themselves on their strangest adventure yet as The Charon's unlikely passengers.
With both comic series co-created and written by John Layman, it's a no-brainer that the blending of the respective casts would be smooth, but more surprising is how easily Layman slips back into Tony Chu and John Colby's voices after years away from the Chew lead characters. The two mesh with the sci-fi world of Outer Darkness quite well, and Layman brings the screwball comedy and self-aware storytelling that he employed well in Chew to the darker, more dangerous world of Outer Darkness. In that sense, the crossover -- at least in its debut issue -- feels more like a natural extension of Chew than of Outer Darkness tonally, despite taking place primarily in the latter's setting.
With Chew co-creator and artist Rob Guillory returning to provide a new twist on a classic sequence from the middle of the previous series' run and the sequences set within Outer Darkness illustrated by the Skybound series' co-creator and artist Afu Chan, the transition and blend is relatively seamless. Layman even calls out the visual change in his script. Tonally, this is very much a Chew tale but, visually, Chan makes this all feel right at home in the horrifying world of Outer Darkness, with Tony and Colby reacting to the sci-fi series' colorful, eclectic cast as only they can while delving into the unknown.
Perhaps a better introduction to the world of Outer Darkness than to the world of Chew -- though Layman and Guillory do provide a concise primer to Tony Chu and his unnatural abilities as a cibopath -- the three-issue crossover miniseries promises a more freewheeling adventure across the cosmos. The various monsters and demons that haunt Outer Darkness' starways are sure to make an appearance as Tony and Colby find themselves drafted into an interstellar diplomatic mission.
For Chew fans' this miniseries is a stark reminder of how much fun the old series was and how much its characters and their world have been missed. Even though the previous series ended on a surprise staccato, the crossover proves there's plenty more to explore in the Chew world, while leaning further into the wacky sense of fun than the heart-wrenching emotion that defined much of the series' final story arcs. And with Layman finding a surprising amount of humor from Outer Darkness' cast intermingling with Tony Chu and John Colby, the miniseries is off to a strong start.
Outer Darkness/Chew #1 is available on now.