I TOOK A HAMMER TO HELL #1 is a comic written by Matt Garvey with art by Mulele Jarvis and colors by Fabi Marques. A man heads down to Hell with a hammer and a desire to battle the Devil. This is a supernatural comic with drama and plenty of violence. The main man for this story is Jake Wilson, he is an angry person who made a deal in the past and it is now time to pay up. Throughout the course of this story we’ll meet many devilish/demonic creatures. The story begins with Jake in his garage sitting at a workbench drinking what looks like coffee and staring at an old picture. He is interrupted by an imp-like creature who reminds him that in three days, his soul will belong to the Devil. The violence here has brutal, gruesome shots and is very bloody and gory. The pacing is steady overall with a few faster moments. The tone is dark and serious with a few highly intense moments. The dialogue is mostly conversational with aggression and some narration of Jake’s inner thoughts. There are no word-heavy pages here. This is a debut issue that gives us an angry, focused lead and places him in a story that promises and delivers on serious violence.

            The comic here is drawn in a modern style with a high amount of detail and decent shading. The color range here is realistic with a lot of brown and reds as well as dark tones. There are some nice shots of the starry sky but most of the scenery is just darkness and long stretches of rocky ground. The starting location is Jake’s garage which is where his tools are but most of the scenes here take place in Hell. The backgrounds usually show the surroundings which helps add weight to each moment. The expression level here is above-average as the looks are strong with a decent variation. The main emotions here are anger and sadness with sinister happiness. The faces have a good amount of detail and each expression the characters give is very clear. The violence here is has very gruesome attacks with substantial blood and gory dismemberment. The action scenes feature a decent-to-good amount of panels and it all flows well.

“Is this worth reading?”

Yes.

“Would I like this?”

If you like supernatural stories with a bit of drama that star angry man and feature a large amount of violence then this is for you.

“What would this comic’s film rating be?”

R. Violence, blood, gore.

“Could I get a quote from the comic?”

“Will he be coming to collect me himself?”

 

Physical Link: https://garveycomics.com/products/i-took-a-hammer-to-hell-1-mulele-cover

Kickstarter Link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mattgarvey/i-took-a-hammer-to-hell-1/description

***IN-DEPTH COMIC STATS BELOW***

Probably Contains Spoilers

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Actual Pages(not counting covers and credits): 24

Violent Pages: 6, for 25% of the comic

Sexy Pages: 0, for 0% of the comic

 

**The levels below aren’t necessarily maintained throughout the whole comic, but they were definitely reached**

 

Violence Level – 3

“Wasn’t no tussling at all.”

“Sometimes you gotta hit somebody.”

“I’m getting charged with how many counts of assault?”

“This was a tournament arc.”

“All my life I had to fight.”

 

Gore Level – 5

“The only thing leaking out your face is tears.”

“Looks like somebody spilled some ketchup.”

“Might need to soak that up with a bath towel.”

“That isn’t supposed to be outside the body.”

“This is a slaughterhouse.”

 

Death Level – 3

“And everybody lived happily ever after.”

“We might have gone to a couple funerals.”

“It just LOOKS like a serial killer was here.”

“Yeah this was a tragedy.”

“Think Gettysburg.”

 

Porn Level – 1

“Everybody kept their clothes on.”

“I guess it was too hot for a bra.”

“Sometimes you got to let everything air out.”

“This is like late night Cinemax in the early 2000’s.”

“Oh. This is porn.”