Faith is a young woman who dabbles in magic in order to makes things happen—and she would really like something to happen. When she meets Poppy, Faith finds herself in a world of glamour and mystery. She quickly attracts the devil’s attention, and Faith is soon on her way to fame and power. But what price will she pay?
There are stories that build up their characters and narratives in between the sex scenes, but Faithless is not one of them. After Faith meets Poppy, the story jumps from one sex scene to the next while throwing in some supernatural horror and a good old deal with the devil trope for good measure. While increasingly strange and frequently horrible things happen around Faith, the story never quite comes together in a way that makes sense or is interesting, especially since many scenes seem to exist to shock the reader.
The shallow characterization has much to do with why the story’s narrative does not come together. Faith is thrown into some pretty dark situations, but she doesn’t really engage or grapple with the issues that confront her. As a result, she seems batted around by others and doesn’t really grow as a character. Her selfishness also makes it very difficult—if not impossible—to like her as a character. The supporting characters do not have much depth either—even Poppy and the devil do not much have from a characterization beyond their good looks and charisma. The lack of characterization further weakens the scattershot narrative, prevents any real meaningful buildup for key moments, and makes the sex scenes feel gratuitous.
The one thing that Faithless has going for it is art. The color palette, with its mix of dark and neon colors, set an edgy mood. The set-up of the panels is clear and easy to follow, and the compositions and coloring work together to effectively convey both the glamorous world and spooky supernatural elements with equal skill. Unfortunately, the artwork is not enough to redeem Faithless.
Because of its sex scenes and nudity, Faithless definitely belongs in the adult section of any library collection. However, the disconnected story and poor characterization make it difficult to recommend this for any collection.
Faithless, Vol. 1
By Brian Azzarello
Art by Maria Llovet
ISBN: 9781684154326
BOOM Studios, 2020
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NFNT Age Recommendation: Adult (18+)
