Colder #2
Written by Paul Tobin
Art by Juan Ferreyra
Cover by Juan Ferreyra
Dark Horse Comics
Release date: December 5, 2012
Cover price: $3.99

Colder is a really, really weird comic, and that’s putting it lightly. In a mental institution in Massachusetts during early LSD experiments in the 1940s, a fire breaks out and begins to consume the hallucinating asylum inmates. At the same time, an other-worldly being named Nimble Jack appears out of some kind of wormhole and beings to devour the inmates’ sanity. One inmate in particular who he feeds off is Declan Thomas. However, due to the raging fire, Nimble Jack doesn’t get to finish off Declan as the building collapses. Luckily, Declan survives the incident unscathed; however, his body temperature has dropped significantly and continues to do so throughout the years. Cut to modern day and Declan is living with a nurse named Reece in her home. Reece cares for the man since he has no family and nowhere to go. He is essentially an introvert. He doesn’t say or do anything other than clean and dress himself. After Nimble Jack appears in current day and comes into contact with Reece, Declan announces that he’s been “alive” the entire time and now has something to share with Reece.

In this second issue of the series, Declan has now decided to finally speak to Reece and wants to show her what being insane really means. The couple travel around Boston as Declan shows Reece what the “insane” see and manages to help remove the problem from that person. Meanwhile, Nimble Jack is running around feeding off of people and looking for Declan.

Paul Tobin isn’t really a well known horror or fantasy writer for the most part. Most of his well known works have been for various super-hero titles at Marvel, DC, Dynamite, etc. However, in this series Tobin and artist Juan Ferreyra are painting a very vivid picture of the line between sanity and insanity. The characters and the conversations are very two-sided at some points and make you go back and re-read them to make sure you didn’t miss a double meaning. At the same time, Ferreyra’s fantastic artwork captures the other half of your imagination with his colorful depiction of the average world and the world beyond sanity. When you start to see what “crazy” people see in Colder #2, Ferreyra’s artwork brings out the best in the “crazy.”

Only just the second issue in this series of five and I can’t wait for more. The line between the real and unreal, sanity and insanity is present and accounted for as Tobin and Ferreyra continue the journey down the rabbit hole as Declan and Reece try to figure out what’s going on and how to fix or stop it and Nimble Jack continues his feast on the unsuspecting people of Boston.