JENNIFER BLOOD: BATTLE DIARY #1, by Dynamite Comics on 11/29/23, sends the latest Jennifer Blood on a retrieval mission for a white supremacist biker gang, only to learn their next target is a prison guard who won’t play ball.
The Details
- Written by: Fred Van Lente
- Art by: Robert Carey
- Colors by: Dearbhla Kelly
- Letters by: Jeff Eckleberry
- Cover art by: Joseph Michael Linsner (cover A)
- Comic Rating: Teen+
- Cover price: $4.99
- Release date: November 29, 2023
Is JENNIFER BLOOD: BATTLE DIARY #1 Good?
Fred Van Lente returns to the Jennifer Blood franchise with a seedy tale of prison breaks, grimy biker gangs, assassination jobs, and seedy bars in JENNIFER BLOOD: BATTLE DIARY #1. If you like your anti-hero vigilantes to get down and dirty, get ready for lots of mud.
Van Lente’s story follows the new Jennifer Blood (daughter of the original Jennifer Blood), who accepts a job to retrieve Raven, an escaped convict and member of a white supremacist biker gang called The Volk. When the deed is done, Blood gets in well enough with the gang to earn a new assignment to kill a prison guard who won’t play nice with the gang’s incarcerated leader. However, the hit isn’t as simple as it sounds on paper.
“Wait! What!? Jennifer Blood is helping criminals and killing innocent people???” you might wonder. Yes and no. Blood is helping the criminal only so far enough to earn their trust and figure out how their operation runs. Without stating it outright, it’s a fair assumption her cooperation with The Volk is a gambit to eventually take the biker gang down from the inside. Or maybe Van Lente is subverting expectations… you never know.
What’s great about JENNIFER BLOOD: BATTLE DIARY #1? Van Lente paints Jennifer Blood as a troubled killer who understands her mother’s legacy and chooses to improve on that legacy but is bothered by a life of constant danger and violence. This version of Blood is a surprisingly complex and conflicted individual, which makes her choices more interesting. Further, Blood’s infiltration of The Volk is masterfully sly.
What’s not so great about JENNIFER BLOOD: BATTLE DIARY #1? Van Lent rushes through the opening setup, so it takes a couple of re-reads to figure out what’s happening. The story begins with Blood visiting her mother’s grave, and suddenly, she’s rescuing a prisoner from being buried alive a few rows over. It’s that kind of out-of-nowhere coincidence that makes the issue feel like events are springing up randomly, until you learn later that it was all connected. In retrospect, the disjointed events tie together in a way that makes sense, but in the moment, they don’t.
How’s the art? The art is just okay. Robert Carey’s panel layouts are fine, and the character designs are solid, but the characters are very stiff, and the backgrounds mostly lack detail. Plus, there’s almost a total lack of clear light sources or shading/highlighting, so the coloring from Kelly is washed out.
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What’s JENNIFER BLOOD: BATTLE DIARY #1 About?
[SPOILERS AHEAD – Click here if you just want the score without spoilers]
We begin with Jennifer Blood visiting her mother’s grade to muse about her choice to take up her mother’s vigilante identity. Blood chooses to get further than her mother ever did by using her training to go after all organized crime. Suddenly, Blood hears a cry for help from a nearby grave, and she digs up a prisoner named Raven, who was temporarily buried as part of a prison escape plan (we figure all this out later).
Blood and Raven commence a lengthy road trip of bars, drugs, and good times until they arrive at the compound of Raven’s biker gang, The Volk. Blood quickly earns the gang’s trust and accepts a new assignment to kill a prison guard who works at the prison where The Volk’s leader is serving time.
We conclude the issue with a discussion about trust, a target who doesn’t match her picture, and a traffic violation.
Keep scrolling for a closer look at preview images of the internal pages, or Click Here to jump right to the score.
Final Thoughts
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JENNIFER BLOOD: BATTLE DIARY #1 begins the next mission for the world’s deadliest vigilante when Blood infiltrates a criminal biker gang. Van Lente’s story bears all the hallmarks of a great Blood kill-fest in the making, but the beginning feels underdeveloped.
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