I’ve always been interested in religion, I see them as a form of storytelling, so I love when the books and comics I read include and work with these old stories and breathe life into them anew.
That’s what The Wicked + The Divine does, it takes a concept like reincarnation and godhood and it brings it into the modern era, add in a splash of drama, a drop of intrigue, an ever present undercurrent of sexual tension and a murder mystery and you have a recipe for a roller coaster comic series that keeps you hanging on for more.
The art is vibrant and the story more than just being interesting is well written. I never see what’s coming around the corner and have been blindsided by the twists on multiple occasions.
As for LGBTQIA inclusion and representation this comic has more than its fair share. The story centres on a Pantheon of roughly a dozen characters (and a supporting cast of at least half a dozen regularly occurring characters ) and of these there’s at least one lesbian, a couple of gay guys, a trans character, bisexuals, pansexuals, you get the point a whole heap of subcultures and minorities are represented. Unsurprisingly for a story that steers away from convention the stereotypes are also pretty well avoided.
Luckily for non-readers this comic book series is being adapted for a television series so my husband and other non comic folk will be be able to enjoy it in its entirety in no time.