Bonnie McDaniel's Reviews > Monstress, Volume 8: Inferno

I own all of this comic's volumes (like many people, I prefer to buy the paperback collections), but while I still like this series, I must admit it is getting more convoluted and harder to follow. This collection in particular tips a bit into batshit-crazy territory, as we spend nearly all of our time in a sort-of dreamscape and sort-of alternate world portal. Among other things, we find out (if I'm interpreting what I read correctly) that Maika Halfwolf, our protagonist and titular "monstress," is some sort of forbidden maybe-offspring of Zinn, the Lovecraftian monster/old god she carries around inside of her? (See, I told you it's getting more convoluted by the minute.) Maika also spends all of her time in this dreamscape as a disembodied head attached to one of Zinn's tentacles, while the ghost of her younger, more innocent and less ruthless and cynical self runs around trying to free the Maika-head, Ren, Kippa and Zinn.

Sana Takeda's art is as lush and gorgeous as usual, but I noticed an unfortunate trend in this volume that I've seen before: she tends to use the same face shapes and features both for the human characters and the nonhuman many-eyed monsters, and as a result it is sometimes really hard to distinguish between the characters. That is exacerbated in this book, and it makes for a more confusing story. Which is too bad, as this is a complex world and well-drawn characters. Unfortunately, this is not one of the better volumes in the series. Hopefully next time around that will change.