WEPAAAA! Fam, somebody in 1996 looked at a Catholic priest and said, “Cool collar. Where do we put the shotgun?” Maximum Press answered with Priest, and these first two issues have absolutely zero interest in easing you into Sunday service. We got a metal mask, a trench coat, enough ammunition to make the collection plate nervous, and a man of God whose nighttime ministry leaves shell casings everywhere. This joint smells like a video store action aisle. You can practically hear the plastic VHS case snapping open.
Rob Liefeld supplies the creation and story, Robert Napton handles the script, and Mark Pajarillo brings the pencils. Together, they plant Michael O’Bannon at St. Mark’s in Boston’s South End, trying to help a neighborhood getting chewed up by gang violence. Daytime Michael patches people up and worries about his congregation. His masked other self goes hunting after dark. Read these two issues together and the hook becomes clear fast: the same hands offering comfort are carrying weapons, while Michael cannot fully account for what happens when he goes to sleep. Somebody better check that confessional for a gun rack.
The opening alley sequence comes out barking. A couple of guys leave a club, trouble finds them, and Priest arrives like the last level of a game nobody remembers starting. Pajarillo runs from tight eye shots to flying brass to that hulking armed silhouette. There is no graceful introduction. The comic grabs your shirt. For a book selling a masked vigilante with religious imagery, that first burst delivers exactly the cover’s promise, even if the dialogue sounds like every street tough rented the same three action movies.
Napton gives Michael something decent to do before piling on the misery. His response to a wounded Tommy Johnson shows a caretaker who moves toward danger to help, and his scenes with Sister Lisa briefly let the neighborhood feel inhabited. Those quieter exchanges are needed. Without them, Priest would just be a weapons catalog with a cross necklace. The tragedy involving Lisa pushes the two sides of Michael further apart, although the story rushes her toward that role. Give this woman more room to exist before using her death to crank the lead’s anguish, please.
Issue #2 earns its place beside the debut by widening the mess. The police investigation gets more traction, Michael’s military history enters the picture, and Bishop McCallister’s private behavior makes his lectures about community service look mighty rich. Oh, NOW we got standards, Bishop? His pressure on Michael already stinks in the first issue; the second lets you peek behind the expensive curtains. The corruption is laid on thick enough to spread on toast, but it gives Priest a target beyond another room full of interchangeable gunmen.
Detectives Al Morgan and Jack Hayes help keep those developments moving. Morgan has a personal connection to the parish, while Hayes keeps poking holes in the comforting version of events. Their back-and-forth makes the investigation readable without turning every scene into a case-file recital. Nobody is solving the mystery of the century here. The reader is ahead of the cops almost immediately, so the pleasure comes from watching the evidence creep toward a man who sincerely believes he is helping them.
Pajarillo is having a damn ball drawing this guy. The mask looks hammered onto a permanent scowl, the coat hangs like it weighs forty pounds, and every firearm gets its own little audition. Priest poses with the confidence of somebody who has never caught that coat in a car door. Upward angles sell his size; face close-ups turn fear and anger into big, readable signals. The layouts stack narrow reaction panels around larger impacts, giving the action a stuttering, stop-and-explode rhythm. Subtle? Fam, the muzzle flashes have better attendance than the church.
Some of that posing costs the fights their footing. Bodies crowd the frame, guns dominate the foreground, and the room can become secondary to whichever arm is throwing the biggest shape. The book occasionally tells you who got hit more clearly than it shows how everybody moved. Still, Pajarillo can switch gears: Michael carrying an injured kid has an urgency the glamour shots cannot supply. The military flashback in #2 also gives the second issue a visual change of scenery and a stronger glimpse of the trauma underneath all that hardware.
Sean Parsons and Norm Rapmund ink the first issue, with ink assists from Andy Owens; #2 credits Parsons alongside Pajarillo on selected pages. The heavy shadows and dense marks suit the mask, masonry, and clenched faces, though some smaller panels get crowded. Dan Shadian colors #1, and Todd Pickens takes over for #2, with Extreme Colors and Quantum FX handling separations across both. Purple shadows, metallic highlights, and hot orange gunfire give the pair that glossy period flavor. The second issue’s blazing action and dusty combat scenes keep the visual temperature high without making the parish scenes look identical.
Kurt Hathaway letters both issues, steering the everyday conversations, jagged narration captions, scripture, and all those oversized blasts through some busy pages. The contrast between Michael’s speech and the vigilante’s inner voice is particularly useful. You can follow their separation before the story explains much. The explanation itself is rougher: the recap labels Michael’s condition “schizophrenia,” then describes an alternate identity taking over at night. Those are different things, and the comic blurs them into a convenient mystery switch. Michael’s fear deserves more care than that shortcut gives him.
For the retro heads, even the back matter is a trip. The debut includes rough layouts that let you compare Pajarillo’s planning with the finished pages. The second issue carries Liefeld’s own statements about leaving Image and moving his studio’s books to Maximum Press. You are holding an action comic with a little publishing time capsule tucked behind it. The actual story, though, remains unfinished at the end of #2, with a fresh confrontation being lined up. This pair works as an opening movement, so do not expect a tidy two-issue wrap-up.
Priest #1–2 gets a combined 3/5 from me. There is a sturdy pulp hook, hungry artwork, and enough outrageous attitude to make a retro reread entertaining. Thin supporting characters, blunt villains, and that muddled approach to Michael’s condition keep it from hitting harder. I had fun with this loud little corner of 1996, even while side-eyeing its shortcuts. Digging through the back-issue boxes for masked weirdos with questionable judgment? Pull up, Crusaders. Father O’Bannon has a sermon ready, and apparently the punctuation is buckshot.
Publisher: Maximum Press | Issues: Priest #1 (August 1996) and #2 (October 1996)
Creator/Story: Rob Liefeld | Script: Robert Napton | Pencils: Mark Pajarillo
Inks: Sean Parsons and Norm Rapmund (#1); Sean Parsons and Mark Pajarillo (#2) | Ink Assists: Andy Owens (#1)
Colors: Dan Shadian (#1), Todd Pickens (#2) | Color Separations: Extreme Colors & Quantum FX
Letters: Kurt Hathaway | Editor: Matt Hawkins | Editorial Assistant: Jenny Allevato
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