After a short interlude with the one shot Mandarin Spawn, the regular series continues. The story here picks up in a post-apocalyptic world. Basically Spawn destroyed the world and every human in it so that it could be recreated without God or the devil, which was the only way to end the war between heaven and hell that raged. Both deities have been banished and disconnected from Earth, but the book is sure to point out that they were not, in fact, killed and that Spawn has not achieved godhood.

Beginning again after what the human characters refer to as “the white light,” there is peace on Earth due to the fact that demons can longer come to Earth to possess humans. Of course, the silence is quickly broken as the people in a city apartment building begin exhibiting odd and grotesque criminal behavior. If you ever considered Spawn as something for the kids, this issue should finally make you reconsider. While Spawn does his best to let humanity’s evil destroy itself and not interfere again, the people in the apartment building slowly begin unraveling.

A beautiful young lady becomes obsessed with “what’s underneath her skin” and picks and peels it away as if…possessed. We also meet an old woman creepily at war with the roaches in her apartment and a young girl, who seems to also be possessed (not every little girl goes around storing cockroaches in their mouths after all). By the time the issue ends we are uncertain of many things. What is causing these grotesque crimes?  Will Spawn embrace his inner Al Simmons and help the police get to the bottom of this? Don’t look for any sort of conclusions from this issue but it’s a solid restart after the break.

This issue moves at a pretty slow pace and builds to what’s coming extremely well. If I had picked this up on the day it was released and had to wait a month to see where it was all going it would have undoubtedly kept me awake a few nights. The new order of Spawn comics are top notch in every way. They even give the originals more than a run for their money. In the same respect this is the most graphically violent and dark this title has ever been as well, so, again, this is not for those bothered by horror.

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