Review: The Demon- Hell Is Earth
Quick Summary
Pros: The main storyline has plenty of fun action and excitement. The focus on the characters is interesting and will be appealing to fans of these characters.
Cons: There are places where the story is a bit dull. The artwork is just alright.
Overall: This is an alright book for any comic reader to jump into, but it will be specifically worthwhile for fans of the main characters. Their adventures here highlight their individual personalities and are also just entertaining to see. There are some negatives along the way but, as long as you like the characters, the reading experience is still positive. Readers who are already fans of Etrigan or Madame Xanadu and want to see more of them will probably enjoy this book, but readers with no care or interest in these characters should probably look elsewhere.
Story
The Demon: Hell is Earth, by Andrew Constant, is a decent story about how the strained relationship between a man and a demon can work toward the overall benefit of mankind. The adventure contains some epic battles that help add excitement and action to the book. However, there are moments where this excitement fades and the action feels a bit stale. In the end, the biggest draw to this book is the characters of Etrigan, Jason Blood, and Madame Xanadu, all of whom are well-written and will likely be appreciated by their fans.
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The storyline in The Demon: Hell is Earth has its fair share of positive elements. There are plenty of moments where the action is thrilling and where the narrative gets pretty tense, especially when Etrigan is called in to deal with some enemies. The conclusion of the book, when Etrigan is given an extreme powerup by a dying Merlin, is the pinnacle of this narrative excitement and leads to some of the most memorable scenes in the book.
However, the storyline in The Demon: Hell is Earth also has a few negative elements. There are some chapters that dive headfirst into exposition that ends up being a bit too dull to really maintain attention. After a few Etrigan fights take place, there are also moments where they feel a bit stale and uninspired. These negatives mostly end up counteracting the volume’s positives and cause the actual storyline to just be average.
Luckily, The Demon: Hell is Earth has compelling characters to make up for the relatively average storyline. The personal struggles of Jason Blood, Etrigan, and Madame Xanadu are all interesting and make for some neat drama. These characters have a twisted history of friendship, love, mistrust, and betrayal, some of which is brought in to play again, that causes them to share an equally twisted present. For fans of these characters, their presence here may be enough to make the book worthwhile as a whole.
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Art
The artwork in The Demon: Hell is Earth is alright but doesn’t really stand out much from other mainstream comics. Penciler Brad Walker’s biggest success is in the book’s structure. The action flows nicely and I liked the way in which more chaotic panels were used to add additional drama to fight scenes. However, most of the character depictions look pretty lackluster. This is particularly noticeable with faces, which fail to properly convey emotion in some places and also shift in strange ways in other places. The end result is a book that is visually passable but really isn’t anything special.
Continuity
The Demon: Hell is Earth is the only volume in this standalone miniseries. Though it does stand on its own, it also mentions histories between Etrigan, Jason Blood, and Madame Xanadu that are direct references to the Demon Knights (Reading Order) series. In some ways, this volume could be seen as a pseudo-sequel to that series, which began with Demon Knights Vol. 1: Seven Against the Dark (Review) and ended with Demon Knights Vol. 3: The Gathering Storm (Review).
The story here does not continue in any specific comic.