The Secret of the Wednesday’s Haul

Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray have been blessed with some great artists on their Jonah Hex series. From Luke Ross to Jordi Bernet to Phil Noto, they have had unique artists who have been able to show the beauty and the horror of the American west. So it only makes sense that when they moved Jonah Hex up to Canada for an issue, they’d get a Canadian artist to illustrate that story. Of course, Darwyn Cooke isn’t only known as a Canadian cartoonist. His DC: The New Frontier and The Spirit have shown off the truly fantastic artist and storyteller that Cooke is.

The issue opens up with a father and his young son, the narrator of our story, on a hunting trip in the snow covered woods of Canada. You can tell that the father is excited to be out with his son, trying to cram a life’s worth of stories and education into a single trip. The eagerness in the father’s story telling is matched by his son’s contemplative reflection in the narration as, years later, he looks back on these events. The father taught him some things about life while Jonah Hex would teach him others.

The story casts Hex into an odd role when the narrator loses his father and unknowingly looks for someone to fill the void. Hex is strong, he’s larger than life and he appears protective, the same qualities the narrator’s father showed. To a young boy, Hex fights for justice and for what is right. It’s what any young boy would want in a father so it would only seem natural that once the boy loses his own father, he would think he’s found another in Jonah Hex. Palmiotti and Gray put together a simple story of a boy against the world and also examine the relationships fathers and sons at the same time.

Cooke’s artwork with Dave Stewart providing the colors is the true star of this issue. Cooke’s artwork looks better here than it ever did on The Spirit. His style lends itself a bit better to more the wide open, rustic and violent story being told here than the dark, urban and gritty story he tried to create in The Spirit. Cooke is an artist who knows one very importatant fact– he knows when to stop drawing. The artwork is simple, expressive and lively, showing an Alex Toth-like ability to create an image with only a three or four brush strokes. Combined with Stewart’s colors, you feel the cold and the terror that the narrator suffers through on his own just as you feel the warmth and joy he finds by a fire and his “new” father.

Palmiotti and Gray write a rough’n'tumble Hex, never the good guy and never the bad guy. Hex is one of those bad boys that live by his own rules. While that kind of character isn’t always interesting, Jonah Hex gives the creators the ability to use Hex as a storm blowing through the story while other characters take the center stage. Jonah Hex #33 perfectly shows how no one is untouched or left innocent in the wake of Jonah Hex.

Jonah Hex #33
The Hunting Trip
Written by: Justin Gray & Jimmy Palmiotti
Drawn by: Darwyn Cooke
Colored by: Dave Stewart
Colored by: Rob Leigh