The Shade #8 – Review

By: James Robinson (story), Jill Thompson (art), Trish Mulvihill (colors)

The Story: Yeah, I’d say a drug-addicted demon summoner defines a bad romance.

The Review: One thing that’s come into focus over the course of this series is that the Shade has a much more complicated acceptance of his own nature than we’ve been led to believe.  In fact, he himself doesn’t seem aware of how troubled he is at heart about what he’s become.  Although he puts on a cool show of lackadaisical whimsy, as if he couldn’t care less about anything even remotely linked to his former humanity, all his actions demonstrate otherwise.

This issue centers on that particular contradiction in the Shade’s character.  He emphasizes more than once that he wanted only to “distance myself from the sad thing I now regarded my prior humanity to be,” and yet he can’t seem to stop himself from diving in headfirst when anything related to his prior humanity appears.  Like a mafia boss, he may be capricious, “murderous even at times,” but his loyalty to his family is undeniable.