Sunday, January 3, 2021

"The Picture of Everything Else," From Vault Has a Fantastic First Issue

In, "The Picture of Dorian Gray," it occurs where Dorian's portrait ages and becomes hideous while he remains handsome. At the story's end, an attempt to destroy the picture kills Dorian and makes the portrait beautiful again. Now, imagine if someone had the ability to paint portraits of others, and then anything they did to those pictures impacted the subjects? That'd be dangerous if the partner were a serial killer. 

This hook brings us to, "The Picture of Everything Else," whereupon in the first issue, we meet two young painters at the start of the 1900s in Paris who end-up finding this killer and reaching a deal for him to teach one of them in exchange for sparing his life (although he threatens he always comes back) and him agreeing to not make one of them look guilty for murder (he killed one of his subjects whilst they stood in the studio of the artists by ripping the portrait apart most gruesomely).

Written by Dan Watters with lush and gorgeous artwork by Kishore Mohan, "The Picture of Everything Else," is a stellar concept that could have fallen flat, but thanks to the fantastic characterization and Mohan's beautiful illustrations, this comic impresses. Mohan gives us a quietly gorgeous Paris that hints at the dark evil simmering within--when the horrific moments happen they really hit home.

"The Picture of Everything Else," sinks its claws into readers and doesn't let go. It is one of the best first issues of a series I have had the pleasure of reading and if it keeps this quality up we may be looking at a (very) early contender for my comics of the year when 2021 wraps (hopefully much more happily than the last year did). Without a doubt, seek this comic out and read it.
5 out of 5 stars.

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