Image Firsts: Wytches 1 NM Scott Snyder Jock

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IMAGE FIRSTS WYTCHES #1 (IMAGE COMICS)

STORY BY Scott Snyder
ART BY Jock
COLORS BY Matt Hollingsworth
LETTERS BY Clem Robins
COVER BY Jock
PUBLISHER Image Comics

When the Rooks family moves to the remote town of Litchfield, NH to escape a haunting trauma, they’re hopeful about starting over. But something evil is waiting for them in the woods just beyond town. Watching from the trees. Ancient and hungry.

“There’s a realism to his art where it feels like when he draws Batman or he draws the Rook family, they’re walking in the world we know — it’s not exaggerated,” Snyder said, describing his “Wytches” co-creator’s art to EW. “And yet there’s a discomfort when he wants to bring suspense or when he wants to bring dread, where things are just tilted a little too much, and there’s just a little too much shadow.”

“‘Wytches’ was a much more personal story, more so than anything else I’ve done, and I expected a small readership and instead the fans have just been — wow,” the writer told CBR News in a recent interview about the first arc and what he and Jock have planned when the series returns in late 2015. “The stories and letters they wrote to us, and the things they shared about connecting with Sailor and her anxiety and her bravery and with Charlie and his frustrations and hopes as a parent — all of those things have been one of the most gratifying experiences that I’ve had as a writer.”

After a bullying episode concerning their daughter Sailor ends tragically, the Rooks family moves to a new town to leave those terrible memories behind — only to encounter something far more sinister. Scott Snyder and Jock team up once again to redefine our idea of “Wytches,” inventing a story that will horrify readers on every level.

True to its genre, “Wytches” #1 has all the trappings of a horror piece: the twisted cold open, an isolated house in the woods, strange animal behavior, the flickering appearance of a slender figure — the works. Snyder peppers these elements in organically throughout the issue, spending much more time fleshing out the characters than he does on shock-value thrills. Just when the reader starts to feel safe — following, say, a father-daughter bonding sequence — these conventions creep back into view, building towards the cliffhanger with every iota of suspense that Snyder and Jock can muster. That isn’t to say, of course, that the issue is totally without those unsettling scenes that are jarring based on their sheer brutality alone; no, those come often enough — preceded by an eerie rustling noise that will make your skin crawl — but they both add to the tension and push the plot forward.

As much as the book plays to classic horror movie tropes, Snyder and Jock work in a much more subtle dimension that revolves around thirteen-year-old Sailor. While a more supernatural presence slinks in and out of her peripheral, Snyder and Jock trap her in a “first day of school” nightmare that feels equally real and alarming — one where everyone knows her and her deepest secret, but she has no allies and no support. Her experience there triggers a disturbing flashback to a time where Sailor was mercilessly bullied, bringing the Rooks’ family story full circle just before it ties into the issue’s conclusion; the scene rests on a pervasive, contemporary issue that gives the story a modern touch even as it nods at time-tested genre conventions.

Though Sailor’s first day may not have gone so well, her chemistry with her family lends credence to her character. Through body language and expression, Jock’s figures emanate the love and concern the Rooks’ feel for one another, from Charles’ tense jaw and worried brow, to Lucy’s soft but stable disposition, to Sail’s begrudging smile as she banters with her father. Snyder’s dialogue reinforces this tender relationship easily and naturally, resulting in interactions that are an absolute pleasure to read, but Jock could make these characters stand strong all on their own with this knack for figure work.

Figure work is not the only area in which Jock excels. His thickly inked, rough lines set up the dark mood immediately, throwing readers into a deeply shadowed world. He conveys complex ideas, like the opening’s claustrophobic atmosphere, with delicacy and grace. What’s more, he isn’t afraid of getting a little dirty, pulling off gory and gut-wrenching sequences that will make readers cringe. Between Jock and colorist Matt Hollingsworth, the book has an old, weathered texture that glosses over the page, most notably in the opener. This gives the story an ancient, almost forbidden feel, something akin to finding cursed letters in your basement or cracking open the Necronomicon. Although Hollingsworth leans more on a muted, yellowed palette for day and murky greens and blues for night, he throws in spectacular splotches of red that accentuate Jock’s more horrifying sequences.

Shortly after the series released its first issue in October 2014, Plan B Entertainment announced that they had purchased film rights to the work with the intent to turn it into a major motion picture. They also announced that Snyder and Jock would serve as executive producers, with Brad Pitt, Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner producing.

The film The Wretched borrows multiple elements directly from the comic while not being a direct adaptation. As with the comic, the film focuses on a teenage protagonist who is targeted by a witch who lives in tunnels underneath a large tree. The creature appears as a naked, emaciated, monstrous woman who steals and eats children. In both comic and film, the creature also has the ability to force humans to do her bidding and make people forget about the children whom she takes. The ending also implies that the witch either survived or multiple such creatures lived in the tunnels under the tree.

On April 6, 2021, Snyder announced that Plan B was now working on a TV version of the series with Amazon Prime Video. Snyder wrote the first episode and Jock is creating the storyboards.

Scott Snyder and Jock are to return to Wytches from Image Comics in 2022. Although Scott is returning to it sooner, as the writer’s room for the TV series opens. Scott Snyder talked on his Substack newsletter about Nocterra getting optioned by Atomic Monster, James Wan’s company at Netflix with Roberto Patino, attached to write. And then it was Wytches. Originally by Snyder and Jock, and published by Image in 2014, it tells the story of the Rook family, in particular their daughter Sailor, who move to the town of Litchfield, NH following an incident involving Sailor and a particularly vicious school bully named Annie. The family is also largely unaware that the town is home to its own supernatural secrets, in particular a tradition where a person will pledge another to strange beings, wytches, in the nearby forest in order to gain a boon from them. Snyder writes:

“The Wytches writers room starts tomorrow. I’m crazy nervous about this, I’m in this one. So, this is my first time writing anything for TV, and I can’t talk about the details of who it’s for or that stuff yet, because we didn’t put out a official press statement. So, I don’t want to cross any lines, but it’s a another big place, we’re really, really thrilled about it, and I’m sure we’ll get a chance to talk about it when it gets further along in the process. But they really involved me and Jock in huge ways. I wrote the pilot, which led to the writers room, and I’m writing another couple episodes and Jock is doing the designs and a lot of the concept art for it. So, we’re heavily involved. And it incorporates what was going to be our Season/Arc Two into Season One of the show. So, we’re doing a lot of building out of what would have been the next season or arc of the comic in this initial big robust season of the television show. And then as soon as we’re done, we are going to go back and write and draw Season/Arc/Cycle Two of Wytches. I promise, that is coming. We will do it next year. I think we’re going to start having it come out around Halloween from Image.”

The TV series is from Amazon Prime Video, and his student and friend James Tynion IV is part of that Writers Room.

Near mint condition.