By Mike Badilla

Ah, the south. What can be said about the southern states of America that hasn't already? Cannibal takes place is a small town in Florida called Willow. Thanks to our recap page (thank you to whoever included this) we find out that after a series of hurricanes affected the southeast part of the U.S., it not only caused a lot of damage monetarily but also caused ancient mosquitoes to be awakened from the earth carrying the yellow fever. A pharmaceutical company created a medicine to combat the fever, but it had another effect; causing people to crave human flesh. These people aren't undead zombies though, they are just normal people living their lives. Craving flesh.

We start our issue at a gas station. A woman and a young boy are refueling their car when the boy says he's hungry and starts complaining. The woman tries to get him to wait till the next town before eating anything, as that's when they'll have supper, but the kid is a real whiner and gets on her nerves. They go inside and the boy is allowed to pick out one thing. While he looks around, a man is at the counter arguing with the cashier. The man doesn't have ID but wants a carton of cigarettes. The cashier does not oblige as it's against the law to sell things like that without proper identification. The man storms out, and the woman and kid are next in line.

We find out the woman is "Aunt Louise", and the kid asks her if his dad is sick. The kid wonders this because it seems they are on the hunt for the dad, and Louise tells the kid that they just need to find him to see if he's okay. He keeps asking questions and Louise loses her cool, yelling at the kid (who's name is Boone). As the two drive away, we see the man who wanted the cigarettes come back inside the gas station and attack the man behind the counter.

Next we are at some random house full of police interrogating a man. They're asking him when he saw "Miss Jolene" last. This leads us into the rest of the book; the man being interrogated goes nuts trying to find Jolene. This is the next 20 or so pages, all of which are too boring for me to even recap. Sorry! Were you excited for this book? I was too, by the cover. After the success of Southern Bastards, I was hoping for another book I really liked based in the south. This book? Not it. At all. This seems like a cash grab into the whole zombie thing, just with a "wacky twist". They're not undead. They choose who they want to attack. They can blend in. I get it. How wacky.

The art was lackluster. Fairly even and constant throughout the book, but there were panels that had noticeably less or more detail, especially the scene where the little girl pops out of the house. That little girl didn't even look like she was from the same book or artist. It's almost like the artist got just as bored with the story as I did and just starting slapping down art.

I gave this book a shot based on the cover, as I said. As I started to read the recap page, my hopes for this book started to fade, and by page 10 or so I was no longer interested or impressed. This is a book I'd expect to come out during the huge zombie craze like 2 years ago, and I wouldn't have cared about it then either.

Score: 2/5

Cannibal #2
Writers: Jennifer Young and Brian Buccelato
Artists: Matias Bergara
Publisher: Image Comics