Review by Frank Plowright

Jessica Farm is an experimental project for Josh Simmons, who’s drawn a single page of his continuing story every month since 2000. This second volume, then, contains work produced over an eight year period from early 2008 to the end of 2015. Simmons was presumably aware of his first eight years being collected in 2008, yet the first few pages are largely recap, although as they namecheck all kinds of weird stuff, it’s not much of a recap for anyone who hasn’t read Volume 1.

However, the basic situation transmits easily enough, and as Volume 1 wasn’t entirely satisfying, picking up here is feasible, if not desirable. Simmons usually specialises in unsettling horror, dependent on suspense and unfamiliarity, not threat and violence, but the latter predominate in a protracted battle between strange creatures, as the sample art shows.

While the artistic looseness remains, there is a greater sense of Simmons at least planting some seeds for future possibilities. Although her part is minimal, Jessica is believed to have a saviour’s destiny by the Smiths she located in the barn. Their problem is the Skrats, who they suspect lurk in abundance, but as the Smiths enjoy killing, that can be dealt with. Crangle-Shitters, on the other hand, are a formidable threat.

Volume 2 is slightly more imaginative, but still hampered by the same constrictions as the first. By coming to each page fresh rather than following a pre-determined path the results are disappointing. What’s taken Simmonds eight years to produce covers less than a day in Jessica’s life, albeit a distressingly violent one. However, it’s not unreasonable to ask about the point of producing a page a month on principle if three years of work are just an extended battle sequence?

By the end there’s some movement toward a goal, and a change in Jessica’s relationship status, but overall Jessica’s Farm remains an experiment for an experiment’s sake.