Gerard Way is back in comics with Paranoid Gardens. Along with writer Shaun Simons, illustrator Chris Weston and colorist Dave Stewart, Way introduces readers to Paradise Gardens, a convalescent home for the strange and unusual. Not all the staff are human. In fact, most of the patients aren’t either. In the rooms one can find aliens and superheroes, while a ghost cleans the floors, and a nurse injects nutrition into the walls. Loo is a nurse at Paradise Gardens, but her memory is not what it used to be. In fact, she’s positive there’s a higher calling for her in Paradise Gardens, but she struggles to figure out what it could actually be. Could her healing powers be the key? In the background, one of the doctors seeks the secrets of immortality while promising a theme park cult the property. Will Loo fight through to her memories and save the day?
Paranoid Gardens is, in short, a strange graphic novel. After the Umbrella Academy, it would be an error to expect something entirely normal from Gerard Way and his collaborators. Still, the story is interesting, the art gorgeous, and the theme park cult recognizable enough to be funny but not get Dark Horse sued.
Paranoid Gardens Volume #1 collects issues #1-6. Look for it now from Dark Horse.
