La Muerta: Vengeance #1 (Chapter 3) is a comic written by Mike MacLean, illustrated by Joel Gomez, and colored by Ceci de la Cruz. Santa Muerte sends Maria on another quest for vengeance, this time for someone else. This is a gritty supernatural superheroine comic that has sinister criminal organizations, rampant violence, and nefarious magic users. The leading lady here is La Muerta, real name Maria Diaz. After a near-death experience and a lengthy revenge mission her peace is interrupted by suffering that it is apparently up to her to stop. She is a former Army medic and is very skilled with firearms and in hand-to-hand combat. Santa Muerte is the personification of death who changed Maria into La Muerta. Derek King is a detective who has helped Maria in the past and they have an inconsistent romantic relationship. This story begins near the US-Mexico border where a group of people are being ushered across by armed men. This expedition is interrupted when a large ghostly woman appears and kills the guards before setting her sights on a young boy named Juanito. The perspective then shifts to Maria as she is awoken out of her sleep by a vision given to her by Santa Muerte. The violence here is extremely bloody with gruesome attacks and gore. The pacing is steady overall with a balance of fast and slow scenes. There is a gritty, action-thriller vibe here. The intense moments are usually of a violent kind though some can get a bit dramatic. The dialogue is a conversational English with Spanish added in on occasion; there is frequent back-and-forth along with mid-battle quips. There is also some thought narration from La Muerta. No word-heavy pages here. This is a riveting and violent issue that takes our tried-and-true heroine on another difficult journey with new, dangerous characters and a story that is once again soaked in vengeance.
The art here is drawn in a gritty, somewhat smoothly detailed modern style with a focus on shading. The color palette is mostly blacks and reds with an overall dark and occasionally faded tone. For natural scenery we have the mountains, fields, and bushes adjacent to the US-Mexico border along with trees and well-kept lawns. There isn’t a main location as La Muerta’s search for information and the perspective shifting to the villains occasionally causes this story to go all over the place. We’ll visit the border, a few homes, and an abandoned church. The backgrounds for these different places do a great job of showing the actual surroundings from the grout between the tiles to the chipped paint on a house. The expression level here is around average as hard looks are the norm for the main characters but others give more reactions. Emotions we’ll see here include fear, anger, rage, shock, and pain. The faces have a decent to good amount of detail and they generally show the different expressions clearly. The mystical effects tend to glow a white-green color. The main weapons of choice here are firearms from handguns to mounted machine guns. There are many gruesome attacks that lead to constant bloody moments with some light gore. The action scenes come in lengthy bursts with a higher panel count and a smooth flow with many different angles.
“Is this worth reading?”
Yes.
“Would I like this?”
If you like gritty supernatural superheroine stories that star a Mexican woman and has mysticism, heavy violence, and evil organizations then this is for you.
“What would this comic’s film rating be?”
R. Violence, blood, gruesomeness, light gore.
“Could I get a quote from the comic?”
“Lucky for you, I don’t do this for the money.”
Physical Link: https://coffincomicsshop.com/collections/la-muerta-comics/products/la-muerta-vengeance-premiere-edition
Digital Link: https://coffincomicsshop.com/collections/coffinverse-digital-editions/products/la-muerta-vengeance-digital-copy
Kickstarter Link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/brianpulido/b-pulidos-newest-graphic-novel-la-muerta-1-vengean/description
***IN-DEPTH COMIC STATS BELOW***
Probably Contains Spoilers
*
*
*
*
*
Actual Pages(not counting covers and credits): 46
Violent Pages: 24, for 52% 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 – 4
“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 – 4
“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.”
