Blood Train (one-shot) 2025 - Comic Review

One thing about the comic community—and I suspect this isn’t unique to comics—is that “everything is good.” Either people suffer from social desirability bias or only review comics they already like, or they hold back honest opinions to avoid hurting feelings.

But what actually makes a comic good? It’s subjective, of course. I love pineapple on my pizza with a passion, while I’ve seen someone nearly gag at the sight of it. I ate their slice.

Blood Train, written by Adam Glass and illustrated by Bernard Chang, is like that pizza slice—but in reverse. I had to stop reading multiple times before I finally forced my way through it.

The comic has nothing going for it except the art—and great art with a bad story is just meh.

To be fair, I get it. It’s a one-shot, and they likely tried to cram a larger story into a small space. But that doesn’t excuse a weak narrative. Plenty of one-shots, especially in horror, manage to deliver a tight, compelling story in a single page. Ice Cream Man does it brilliantly. Blood Train? Not so much.

The story feels rushed, incomplete, and utterly apathetic.

SPOILER ALERT

There’s a scene where the team discovers their friend has been injected with something and transforms into a monster. Their reaction? A simple, “Who is this? Oh, it’s our childhood friend. Damn.” Five panels later: “We have to kill her fast.”

And just two panels after that, they’re cracking jokes.

"Rushed and apathetic" might actually be the kindest way to describe it.

The art does what it’s supposed to, but I was so bored by the writing that I barely paid attention to it. And that’s a shame.

P.S.
I also like cilantro.