The next chapter in Jeff Lemire’s critically acclaimed series sees the surprise return of an old friend, but what does it mean?
Warning: This article contains spoilers for Sweet Tooth: The Return #1 by Jeff Lemire, José Villarrubia, and Steve Wands, as well as Lemire’s original Sweet Tooth series.
In the wake of the hype surrounding the upcoming Netflix adaptation of Sweet Tooth, original series creator, Jeff Lemire, and colorist, José Villarrubia, have teamed up once more for a six issue mini series to revisit their violent and twisted post-apocalyptic world.
Issue #1 of Sweet Tooth: The Return was released this week. Although the story kicks off 300 years after the original, it echoes the events of Sweet Tooth’s very first issue. An antlered boy, haunted by nightmares of a big man with cold eyes, lives out his youth while confined to a small patch of forest. As Gus did way back in 2009, the antlered boy chooses to escape his picturesque prison. Once free, he stumbles into the very person who has been disturbing his dreams. A man that’s been dead for over 300 years. Jepperd.
Return from the dead
Tommy Jepperd was the hard-ass hockey player who guided and protected Gus, the original series’ main protagonist, through most of his journey. The last time we saw Jepperd was in Sweet Tooth #39 as he bled out onto the icy floor of a secret lab. Even if he hadn’t have died during those emotional scenes, he would have expired from old age long before the point where Sweet Tooth: The Return #1 picks up. For a 300-and-something-year-old dead man, he’s looking pretty alive and well.
What does this revelation tell us about this series’ latest installment? Was this just a figment of the imagination or was he real? Could this Jepperd and the antlered boy be clones of Sweet Tooth’s original cast? We know the technology used to exist. In Sweet Tooth #36, Dr. Singh revealed that Gus had been cloned from the remains of ancient gods, an event that supposedly brought about a plague that wiped out humankind. Has nobody learned their lesson from last time?
In Sweet Tooth #40, the epilogue for the entire series, Gus described how hybrids shunned human technology and have since been living in harmony with nature. He summarised the events of the final war between hybrids and humans, their truce, and the passing of the last of the humans. This begs the question, who are the religious fanatics keeping the antlered boy captive in Sweet Tooth: The Return? They are humanoid, but are they human? Who built this subterranean civilisation and forest that thrives under a metal sky? Are we even on Earth? Jepperd’s return signals that anything is possible.
As the opening lines from this miniseries suggest, history repeats itself, “like a wheel or a story with no end”. With high tech security systems and robotic guards, the antlered boy’s escape felt a little too convenient. Was this and the appearance of Jepperd all part of a larger plan? Is someone out there keeping the wheel turning? Are we repeating historic events by design? If so, to what end? That path is sure to bring a lot of blood and pain.
Lemire dealt with the fine line between faith and lies many times in the original Sweet Tooth, so it’s no surprise that the same theme makes an appearance in the debut issue of this new miniseries. Jepperd appears to be back from the dead, but remember, just because you believe something to be true doesn’t mean it is. Sweet Tooth: The Return #1 feels familiar and a little safe, but if Sweet Tooth has taught me anything, that means someone’s been lying to you.
Sweet Tooth: The Return #1 is available to buy from November 3rd.
