The New Jersey Devil is the best-known legend in New Jersey so much so that its National Hockey League team is called the Devils. With that said, it’s prime real estate for movies, TV shows and comics to be based on it with the most recent comic called “Let This One Be a Devil by James Tynion IV and Steve Foxe with artists Piotr Kowalski and Brad Simpson.
In 1909, in the Pine Barrens area of New Jersey, Henry Naughton returns to his childhood home to help his mother. One night he hears a horrible noise coming from the chicken coop. When he goes to investigate it he sees the Jersey Devil which he thinks might just be an animal and is determined to find out the truth about it. We also get a flashback to the Jersey Devil’s legend where he was born in 1735 to Deborah Leeds (it’s Jane Leeds or Mother Leeds in the legend.)
The title comes from the part of the legend that says that while Mother Leeds was giving birth to her thirteenth child she yelled “Let this one be a devil!” The baby turned into a devil right in front of everyone’s eyes.
There isn’t much to Henry’s story except for there to be a person for the reader to latch onto and experience the mayhem the devil has unleashed on this town. Of course, there is that whole thing where he did leave the town to go to college in the big city so now everyone considers him an outsider. What will happen to Henry may be interesting and even frightening but for now, it’s just setup. Having the narrative also focus on the Leeds family may be a negative since there’s almost nothing we know about them. Again, wait and see.
The art gives off the old-timey 1909 feel with some nice character designs. The devil, what we’re able to see of him, looks scary and imposing but he would look scarier if most of his front wasn’t shadowed out. There’s a lot of background detail that makes this world seem alive and lived in and not just to have backgrounds. The inside of the Naughton house, for example, is full of things like bowls, furniture, cups, a mop, pictures and other things.
“Let This One Be a Devil” may not have much story at first but this may be just the setup for an amazing story. The Leeds story could be harder to pull off since the writers have to make up a bunch of stuff and the comic’s art is fantatsic.
