Something is Killing the Children is an ongoing comic series by James Tynion IV, Werther Dell’Edera, and Miquel Muerto (I copied and pasted all those names). It starts with children disappearing in Small Town, USA – which is somewhere in Wisconsin. There we meet James.
His friends’ bodies were found, but many were not. The principal (while encouraging James to punch the kids who say James is so gay that he killed his friends) said it’s probably a rabid bear. Or something.
Spoiler (?): it’s not a bear.
Erica Slaughter’s job is to kill monsters that kill children. She shows up in a town where children are disappearing, she acts suspicious and follows kids around, then leaves and the children stop disappearing. It kinda seems like she’s the killer. Obviously the reader and children know otherwise, but still. It’s a bad look.
Not that she cares. All she wants is to protect children from monsters. She and her evil octopus plushie are alone on this journey.
Erica came from an organization that supposedly also cares about protecting children from monsters, but not as much as cover-ups and ends justifying means.
The first three volumes were good. We get Erica’s monster killing and town saving formula. She saves the (remaining) children in this Wisconsin town.
Volume 4 was good. We see her backstory and her family (found and otherwise). We find out how evil her talking octopus plushie is.
Volumes 5-7 are so good I’m reluctant to keep reading. The child who survived the monster attack is Gabi. The town is a failure of a tourist trap in New Mexico. The monster is more dangerous, but we know Erica is a badass who can and will totally kill any and all monsters.
Then a new kind of monster shows up.
I don’t know how the series can maintain this quality, but I’ll find out.
