Blackwood: The Mourning After #1

Four young students — including a pink-haired girl, a young man in a patch-badged jacket, a dark-haired girl, and someone wearing an eye patch — peer out from a framed portal overhung with ivy and cobwebs, a snarling gargoyle looming above them and a chained chimp clutching a book below, with a shadowy gothic mansion and moonlit water visible in the background. It's a richly atmospheric opener from writer Evan Dorkin and artists Veronica Fish and Andy Fish, whose cover composition layers occult-school unease with genuine wit — that chimp with a book is doing a lot of work. If the 2020 Dark Horse series Blackwood left you wanting more, The Mourning After picks things right back up with the same moody, affectionate sensibility.