Hellraiser: The Deep Gospel – Denial is her Love Language

Overview

Writer: Tini Howard

Artist: Jenna Cha

Colorist: Brad Simpson

Letterer: Ed Dukeshire

Cover Artist: Rebeca Puebla

Hell has rules. The Order of the Gash has rules. And the Female Cenobite is about to learn exactly what happens when you do not follow them.

This first issue focuses on the Female Cenobite’s rebirth and her introduction to the brutal, bizarre hierarchy of Hell. The Engineer has plans for her, the other Cenobites have opinions, and nobody is exactly handing out welcome baskets. Instead, she is thrown into a series of lessons designed to teach her about suffering, desire and survival.

It is not the kind of Hellraiser story that starts with a puzzle box, a doomed human and someone making a very bad decision in a dusty attic. This is a story about the Cenobites themselves. That makes it feel a little different, but it also gives the book a chance to explore the strange world behind the chains.

Writing

Tini Howard leans hard into the mythology of Hellraiser, and that is a good thing. This issue is creepy, philosophical and extremely uncomfortable in all the ways it should be. The story keeps coming back to the idea that pain, pleasure and identity are all tangled together, which is very much the Hellraiser way.

The Female Cenobite is a strong lead because she is not just being tortured for the reader’s benefit. She is learning. She is adapting. She is trying to figure out where she belongs in a world where everybody has scars, secrets and a very specific opinions about what suffering is supposed to mean.

The pacing is a little slower than a typical first issue because so much of the story is focused on teaching us how this version of Hell works. But the issue does not feel empty. Every scene is building toward the Female Cenobite becoming something bigger, nastier and more important than she was at the start.

Also, the Engineer is deeply unsettling. Which is saying something in a book full of skinless monsters, chains and people treating body horror like a job interview.

Art

Jenna Cha is absolutely killing it here. The art is disgusting, elegant and weirdly beautiful. Hell feels like a living thing: fleshy tunnels, bone-covered spaces, torn bodies and creatures that look like they crawled out of somebody’s worst nightmare.

The Cenobites all look distinct, which is important when you are dealing with a cast of pale, mutilated, leather-clad beings hanging around Hell. The Female Cenobite has a cold, commanding presence even before she fully understands her role, while the Engineer looks like a nightmare made out of teeth, muscle and bad intentions.

Cha also knows when to go big. There are several full-page moments that hit hard, especially when the violence becomes more abstract and surreal. But the smaller close-ups are just as effective. A face, an open wound or a hand reaching into someone’s body can make the whole page feel uncomfortable.

Brad Simpson’s colors do a lot of heavy lifting too. The blues and purples make Hell feel cold and alien, while the reds show up at exactly the right moments to make the blood and gore hit harder. Nothing feels muddy, even when the pages get very crowded and very gross.

Final Thoughts

Hellraiser Resurrections: The Deep Gospel #1 is a strong opening for readers who want more Hellraiser mythology and less “regular people solve a puzzle box.” It is bleak, strange, violent and full of ideas about desire, pain and transformation.

This is not a casual horror comic. It expects you to sit with its ugliness for a while. But if you are a Hellraiser fan, that is probably exactly what you came for.

Overall Grade: 8/10

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