Reviews:
*Marked #2*
Possibly missing out on the first issue left this one left me a little confused. There was a nice recap on the first page though so I wasn’t stumbling around in the dark. The artwork in this minibook is really nice. Great shading work, much like it says in their quote comparing it to Sin City. So minus a few points on the confusion, but overall a good paced nice looking action filled issue.  I should add that the artwork in this book is 1.5" x 1.75" it’s a lot of fun in a small package.
~ Decapitated Dan, From the Tomb

Marked #2 is a miniature comic book with some meat in it! Mark was a demon hunter with a demon inside of him. However, his demon escaped on a demon hunt and is out to kill him and take the things that he loves. This would make a great full sized comic book – and yet it's all packed into a miniature book.
The art could use a slight bit more detail, but it definitely gets the story across. There are some good perspective drawings in it which add a lot of action to the story. Luckily and unluckily a lot of the gory detail in this comic has been left out of the art and it found in words. It has a strange bittersweet ending with lots of room for another story.
Thank you Brian Mitchell and Jeremy Johnson!
~ Karen Maeda, Sequential Tart

Jeremy Johnson draws issue two of MARKED, Mitchell’s tale of a man possessed by a demon that he finds a way to free himself from. Of course, what should be a happy occasion isn’t quite so, since the beast goes on a rampage and begins looking to kill and destroy everything the man cares about. MARKED works because it has some nice pacing and because Johnson finds a way to use the small format to his advantage.
~ Marc Mason, Comics Waiting Room

*Marked #1*
Jeremy Johnson handles the art chores on MARKED, one of the more commercial concepts Mitchell has produced. A retired demon hunter (with a secret of his own) begins investigating the death of his girlfriend’s sister, which sets him back on a path for justice. This book is very high concept, and the ending leaves it wide open for further adventures of the main character. Johnson’s work is a little on the inconsistent side, vacillating between easy to follow and somewhat obtuse in its choices of angle and p.o.v. If there are to be further installments, that’s something that would need to be worked on.
~ Marc Masters, Comics Waiting Room

…speaking of mini-comics, Marked takes the terminology very seriously and gives us a fun little book that’s literally about the size of a book of matches. It’s full of the same visceral images found on the cover in the form of ghouls, danger, and violence. The layouts remind me of some of the original Tijuana Bibles with a single wide open panel adorned by typed-looking text on the bottom of the page. Looking at the single images, Johnson uses shadow very nicely in the outdoor sequences, and especially on facial details like obscured eyes or stray wisps of hair. Taken as a whole though, the art doesn’t flow well page to page, with different slightly related images being strewn together, held in place only with the narrated text on the bottom. I like that Mitchell’s story isn’t afraid of violence or disturbing images. It never plays as gratuitous, simply a writer who doesn’t shy away from the story he wants to tell and has a clear picture of it in his mind. It shows confidence, which is always an attractive quality. On the down side, I have a couple of quibbles with the text. The first is the use of the ampersand, “&,” which is a little jarring and questionable in spots. When you begin a sentence with it, it really disrupts the flow of the text. The second is use of the term “prey.” I’ve never seen it used this way, but two examples go like this: “for a vulnerable prey” and “an easy prey.” I think those phrases could have omitted needless words and simply been “for vulnerable prey” and “easy prey.” While the original use might technically be grammatically correct, it’s extremely clunky sounding. Marked ends with a twisty cliffhanger and despite some small glitches, I’m intrigued by the size, reasonable price point, and plethora of additional titles available at: www.silbermedia.com/comics. Grade A-.
~ Justin Giampaoli, Poopsheet

This book is the newest series from Silber - yet apparently, one of the author’s first, having been through a myriad of different artists before reaching this point in time. It’s a fairly good story, but one that invokes “rape” right near the beginning, which pulled me right out a bit. There’s just too much rape in comics nowadays, I swear.
Anyway, the rest of the story (concerning a man whose mission in life is to kill monsters) is pretty solid, but definitely reads like an earlier work. While newer offerings have slimmed down the text content, this one remains very verbose, almost to a fault. Still, it’s not a bad read... just one that’s not quite to my tastes.
~ Brandon Schatz, Comixtreme

Hey, why not one more series?  He already has 4 going strong.  If you make comics and this guy doesn’t make you think that maybe you should be a little more productive, I don’t know what would do it.  Productive and consistently entertaining, all while using different artists for different projects, is impressive no matter how you look at it.  In this issue an old monster fighter comes out of retirement after his girlfriend’s sister is brutally murdered at a local park.  No, I’m not sure what being a monster fighter entails either, but I’ll bet we learn that over the course of the series.  Anyway, he manages to lure the murderers out of hiding by pretending to be a drunk (i.e. dousing himself with booze), but the fight doesn’t go well and he’s forced to take a desperate and drastic action.  I get the fact that I’ve been praising all these books for months now, so this probably won’t have much impact, but this comic sings.  The cadence of the dialogue, the fight scene (even with it being all scrunched up in this tiny comic, it didn’t suffer a bit), and that ending were all pitch perfect.  These comics are all ridiculously affordable, and you’d have a hard time going wrong trying any of them.  Today this has the potential to be my favorite of the bunch, but talk to me tomorrow and I’ll go with a different series.  That speaks to some serious range, and if he’s able to do another five series at this high level I say go for it.
~ Kevin Bramer, Optical Sloth

Marked is a departure from Brian’s other work. Yet, at the same time, it falls victim to the author’s own personal clichés.
Brian John Mitchell seems to use the “damsel in distress” model frequently. In particular, sexual abuse and rape are very prevalent (violence in general is prevalent in his work).
Point is, I like the overall concept — I’m just sick of seeing the author write male characters fighting for the honor of sexually abused women who are often often portrayed as miscalculating and defenseless.
The art here by Jeremy Johnson is very solid. It’s got a traditional superhero flair to it, which feels very fitting.
The excellent concept I mentioned before is part superhero, part modern horror anime, and part MTV’s The Head — “He” is retired monster hunter / demon killer that gets thrust back into the business and ends up in some deep @#$%.
It’s a good hook and I look forward to Marked #2.
~ Nick Marino, AudioShocker

Another new title in the latest round of Mitchell's minicomics is “Marked.”  This supernatural series revolves around a retired monster hunter who gets sucked back into his former life when his sister is brutally murdered.  Jeremy Johnson does an amazing job on art, and lends  great atmosphere to the story with just one panel per page.  In the fist issue, the monster hunter confronts the demons that killed his sister, and we find out he's got a big secret of his own that he just let out.
~ Brian LeTendre, Secret Identity Podcast

Although the story in the first issue of Marked is relatively self-contained there's little doubt it's just the opening salvo of a much longer saga.
The hero in Marked is a demon fighter. He's drawn out of retirement when he learns the sister of his girlfriend was violently murdered. He goes to the scene of the crime to avenge her death.
Mitchell is a great storyman and he uses the format of his micro minis to great advantage, slowly revealing information and building tension with every turn of the tiny pages.
The artwork by Johnson is a nice match to the story. It's great to see artist and writer working together like this to make the overall package stronger and more dramatic.
Marked is 56 b&w pages, which includes the self-cover. Approximately 2" x 2.25", handmade, untrimmed, with saddle stitch binding. It's available for $1, like Mitchell's other micro minis through the Silber Media website.
~ Midnight Fiction

*Marked #2*
It may have finally happened: Brian may have finally spread himself too thin with the pile of minis he’s putting out on a constant basis.  I thought this issue was a little too pat, wrapped up a little too neatly.  Things start off with a recap of the last issue (Brian has always gotten this right), then our hero Mark the former demon hunter (called out of retirement in the last issue) wakes up after taking a beating from his own inner demon, which he had to unleash to defeat the other demons.  The issue is a mad dash from there, with the demon killing Mark’s girlfriend in his apartment, Mark getting a train ticket to get out of town (as he understands completely that “my inner demon came to life and killed my girlfriend” wouldn’t fly with the cops), and the demon confronting Mark at the train station.  I’m still having trouble putting my finger on exactly what it was that felt… less in this issue than in the rest of Brian’s work.  The ending was very neat, sure, especially when you consider how much trouble Mark knew it would be to release his demon and the relative ease with which their fight went (not to give anything away or anything, even though I kind of just did.  Dammit).   With his consistent record of quality he’s earned the benefit of the doubt from me, so I’m guessing this inner demon thing will get explained more fully in future issues, or maybe he’ll just ditch this series entirely and focus on the half dozen other series he writes.  Still, there’s some great artwork by Jeremy on these tiny pages, and the story all by itself was engaging.  There was just something a little bit lacking.  Yes, I know that as a reviewer I’m supposed to be able to pinpoint exactly what that is.  Maybe Brian’s desire to have all the issues be at least mildly self-contained, which caused the fight to wrap up too quickly?  That’s a noble goal, to keep everything satisfying if a person only buys one issue.  Ack, I give up.  There’s also the possibility that something in my brain wasn’t firing properly today; keep in mind that’s always a possibility with these reviews.
~ Kevin Bramer, Optical Sloth

Links:
Jeremy Johnson - website
Brian John Mitchell - xo mini-comic
Brian John Mitchell - Lost Kisses mini-comic
Brian John Mitchell - QRD interview zine
Brian John Mitchell - band Remora