Into the Unbeing #2: Deeper and Deeper

What lurks beneath the Earth? Whatever it is, it doesn’t look like it’s supposed to be there. Into the Unbeing #1 set up a perfect setting for a horror story–a cave that looks like a desiccated head. But beyond that, the issue was largely devoid of horror images or moments. That isn’t the case with Into the Unbeing #2.

The remaining three members of Hildur’s environmental survey team stand just inside the cave entrance when Into the Unbeing #2 begins. The team looks for a place to set up shelter and wait out the storm as the geologist and now team leader Zara examines the cave. Nothing is what she expects. And despite their intention, the trio is slowly compelled to travel deeper and deeper into the cave.

Into the Unbeing #2 opens with a splash page of the cave entrance which Sherman depicts even more as a head than in the first issue. Depicting it in the full light of day allows Sherman to apply rich, layered colors. The cave fully looks like an old, almost rotting head. The tongue is purple and swollen. Dark shading accentuates what appears to be high, sharp cheekbones. The head is largely brown with splotches of dark green. And all of this contrasts with the copper brown Sherman uses for the surrounding rock face. 

This disturbing and borderline horrific exterior helps drive the pressure cooker narrative. Panel by panel the story advances, and as the characters descend into the cave, anticipation builds and builds. Part of this owes to the question about what happened to Hildur. Into the Unbeing #2 does not return to her in its opening pages, instead making Zara the viewpoint character. And as a geologist, Zara is the ideal character to examine the cave and speak to how bizarre it is as the trio descends into it.

Thompson’s choice to not address Zara’s background until halfway through Into the Unbeing #2 is a smart choice. On one hand the reader doesn’t know very much about her–certainly not as much as they did in the previous issue with Hildur. But it lets the mystery about the cave keep the focus as the issue opens. Nothing Zara says about the cave is shaped by any agenda her backstory suggests she might or might have.

The cave itself starts morphing into a character as Into the Unbeing #2 goes on. The more Zara investigates it, the more unusual it becomes. But the clinical dialogue used to describe the cave isn’t the principal reason that the cave takes on such a bizarre quality and foreboding quality. Sherman gives the cave walls an almost organic quality at times. Rather than rocky, pointed outcroppings, The walls curve and seem to almost flow up and down. When Zara runs through what looks like a puddle, the splash resembles thick fluid rather than water.

Campbell chooses small dialogue text relative to the size of the bubbles. In the first issue it was merely an interesting style choice. But in Into the Unbeing #2 it helps set a mood. The size of the text, as well as Campbell’s choice to use lower case, makes the dialogue feel small and insignificant. It has a similar effect on the characters by extension. The net effect is to make the cave structure seem all the larger, bigger than anything Sherman is able to depict on the page.