Earlier this year, I reviewed Nick Marino and Daniel Arruda Massa’s miniseries Holy F*ck. Throughout the run, I consistently found the series to be missing that certain something. The artwork was consistent and the writing delivered several gags that were independently funny without fully meshing with each other. My final verdict was that the series as a whole seemed directionless, almost scattershot. But I also kept wanting more. I find myself in that same situation as fall starts creeping in.

Last week, Marino and Arruda Massa returned with the first issue of Holy F*cked. With that, we are cast once more into the lives of Jesus, Satan, and the nun Maria, who have all found happiness in Los Angeles. Jesus has gotten real big into skateboarding (I am certain that although this hasn’t really been explained, it will eventually play a big role). Jesus and Satan are living together, and pretty early on we find out that the devil is pregnant. For her part, Maria works in a soup kitchen, regaling the homeless with old war stories.

Of course, we know that their bliss can’t last. Anansi, the African spirit that most often takes the form of a spider and is connected with knowledge, overhears the news and reports it to Hercules. Hercules is thirsting for revenge: after Jesus and his cohorts defeated Zeus, Mount Olympus deteriorated from a prosperous, “grand utopian metropolis” to a wasteland. And so, out of rage and jealousy that the man who took away his family is about to start his own, Hercules resolves to murder Jesus Christ. Setting his plan in motion, he goes to Earth and, disguised as Thanatos Kostas (a play on the Greek personification of death and a word meaning roughly “constant”), a newcomer to town who is passionate about charity work, he infiltrates the soup kitchen.

That, more or less, is the story.

Continue reading Review of HOLY F*CKED #1: “Provocation for Provocation’s Sake” [Redux] →