"Everybody's got to do something and this is what I'm good at."
—James Calley, Spook
Spook
(written by Joshua Starnes and illustrated by Redneck co-creator Lisandro Estherren) is a comic series published by Red 5 Comics about the CIA's attempts to capture and use ghosts as espionage agents.
It follows the adventures of James Calley, a lifelong spy, as he discovers the by the CIA and other organizations to create 'Spooks' - ghost spies. When Calley is killed on a mission he finds himself becoming the CIA's first 'spook' as he teams with Dr. Alyssa Wybourne to find the evil ghost who killed him and the more evil man who sent the assassin and is intent on unleashing the 'Spook' technology on the world.
Spook contains examples of:
- Big Bad: Mr. Nobody is ultimately behind the attack on NATO, on Calley and all of the other machinations.
- Cassandra Truth: Mr. Nobody tells Alyssa all the details of his plan immediately because he knows she will bring the Spook technology back to the CIA even if she knows his plan counts on it.
- Dragged Off to Hell: The apparent fate of Kurylenko after he is forcibly conjoined with another ghost and loses his mind.
- Love Makes You Crazy: Smilkov's motivation to create ghosts was his love for his daughter and his desire to see her again, causing him to gradually lose touch with reality.
- Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: The series deals with ghosts and the spirit world but introduced entirely as a result of technology obeying certain scientific rules. It is ambiguous how technology based the spooks actually are or how much is truly supernatural and beyond the control of the CIA.
- Our Ghosts Are Different: James Calley and Mr. Nobody are soldiers and spies who have been transformed into ghosts by technological means after their deaths, explaining many classic ghostly acts as psychological side-effects of prolonged isolation.
- Sequel Hook: At the end of the first story Mr. Nobody's buyers have been killed or arrested and Kurylenko has been dealt with but several of the Spook making devices are seen being loaded onto ships and sent to unknown buyers around the world.
- The Spook: Both subverted and played straight which is filled with spies and ghosts who come out of the shadows and become fully fleshed out, but also permanently mysterious characters like Mr. Nobody and the ghost he controls.
- Things That Go "Bump" in the Night: It begins with the ghost Kurylenko attacking dignitaries from NATO with no one understanding why or what is happening to them. This attack kicks off the rest of the story which focuses on CIA officers searching for the boogeyman.
- Tragic Villain: Mr. Nobody is heavily embittered by the way his father attempted to use and dispose of him as part of his long-term infiltration of NATO, causing him to seek revenge on the whole world to make himself feel better.
