Overall, I’ve enjoyed seeing writers Mike Moreci and Steve Seeley bring Cassie Hack back into the world of comics. The five-issue series Son of Samhain does a lot of heavy lifting to establish a new status quo for Cassie, who finds herself with a new partner and a renewed purpose.
I’m still not sure how I feel about that, though. For the briefest of moments, Cassie had as close to a happy ending as one could possible expect. She was in a loving relationship and she was a new mom. But she ends up getting sucked back into the monster hunting business as a cult of monsters is rises up from their underground lair to cause a whole bunch of problems for the surface world.
The biggest development in this five-issue series was the introduction of october, a young boy who is the son of Samhain (the guy who killed Vlad). Like Cassie, he’s got slasher blood in his veins (Cassie’s mom was a slasher), and even at his age he’s pretty darn skilled with instruments of death. Issue five of Son of Samhain sees a new partnership crystallize between Cassie and October, and they ride off into the sunset to kill lots of bad guys.
I think Moreci and Seeley did a nice job of capturing the conflicted nature of Cassie in these five issues. She’s realizing that no matter what she does, she’s always going to be pulled back into this world of monsters and mayhem. She’s not allowed to have a storybook ending, and while that is a bummer for us as readers, it does make for a more interesting character.
I’ve talked mostly about the writing in this series, but I have to give props to Emilio Laiso, whose artwork has been fantastic throughout. Whether it’s the conflicted character moments I just mentioned, or head-lopping, monster fighting action, Laiso has brought it all to the page superbly.
Hack/Slash: Son of Samhain #5 established the new status quo for Cassie Hack and leaves the door open for many more stories to be told in the future. And while I’d love to see her have that happy ending, I’m definitely glad she’s back.