Story by Kurtis Wiebe
Art by Riley Rossmo
Reading Green Wake has been a confusing journey for me. While the first issue was an interesting introduction to this surreal pseudo-afterlife of a town, the intervening issues grew steadily more vague, adding confusion to an already muddled murder-mystery by living in and dancing around increasingly obtuse metaphors.
While the same is somewhat true of issue #4, the explanations and revelations contained within do an admirable job of beginning to tie together the some of the niggling loose ends. We begin to understand some of the characters’ origins, and are given a deeper insight into the nature of Green Wake itself. Again, however, the story flutters in and out of the corporeal, making some of Morley’s revelatory conclusions seem to materialize from thin air.
While I do feel like issue #4 spends most of its time explaining the story to me, let me take a moment to give credit where credit is due: Unlike previous issues, nothing here feels random. The surprises in issue #4 are genuine – and genuinely planned – and for the first time in the series (unfortunately not until the fourth of five issues), I’m honestly intrigued to see how it ends.
I can’t help but wonder if Wiebe’s story is just poorly suited for monthly releases. Taken individually, each part is unduly confounding and lacks the necessary punch to remind you to buy the next issue each month. Taken as a whole, the story feels a little less pretentious and – depending on how Wiebe wraps everything up in issue 5 – potentially more cohesive.
I’m not yet sold that Green Wake is any sort of masterwork of surreal horror, but my befuddlement is starting to give way to curiosity, enough to now allow the conclusion to determine my opinion of the overall narrative.
