Real Hero Shit – Harder Than It Looks
Writer/Artist: Kendra Wells
Color Flattening: Amanda Lafrenais
Publisher: Iron Circus Comics
Publication Date:July 2026
It’s nice to see a creator like Kendra Wells improve over time with their art and storytelling. While the first volume of Wells’ Real Hero Shit had a few sections where the backgrounds seemed lacking, I gave it a pass because it was the first volume of a multi-volume project. In Harder Than It Looks, it’s clear that Wells’ storytelling chops are developing.
The story picks up six months after the first volume. Our adventurers have had their fair share of scrapes and conflicts. During this interlude, Eugene and Ani’s situationship is still going with all the barbs and humor that it entails. Michel is still a tightly wound ball of secrets and Hocus is fully in their belief that the church could do no wrong and definitely has a T4T crush on Michel.
When Eugene gets a fourth and final letter from his mother telling him to return home in three days or his friends will be arrested, the four of them set out for the capital with varying levels of disappointment. When Hocus overuses their magic, it leads to the team splitting up: Ani accompanying Hocus to his home church branch and Michel and Eugene heading to the capital.
During this split, you get some more details about each of these characters. They weren’t just brought together due to circumstance. The deeper into Harder Than It Looks, the more evident it becomes that the four of them needed each other to balance their worst tendencies out. Not to get into spoilers, but Hocus and Ani’s opposite views on religion are not the same as their views about the strength of their beliefs and Michel and Eugene’s issues are hiding in plain sight but one is more shrouded by ignorance than shrouded by fear. This is by far my favorite section of the book and the way that Wells’ character writing bounces off of one another had me hooked.
It should’ve been called Real Hero Shit: Shit Got Real because the seeds of the first volume begin to blossom in distinctly horrifying and hilarious ways. Each one of the characters is confronted with their worst fears and is handed the reality of their position and their pasts. This is not s story about adventure: this a story about responsibility, agency, who has it, and what happens when it’s shirked.
There is a moment in the back half of the book that made me genuinely uneasy but in the way that good drama does. If you liked the religious conflict from the first volume, Harder Than It Looksadds new nuance and horror to it. Also, if you thought that the fact that Eugene is half-human, half-demon would just be some quirky character trait that was glossed over, it’s not.
If there was one critique I’d have about this book is that a plot twist with Hocus happened just a bit too quickly for me. Between the suspicion that his boss/father figure had and the reveal of what brought Hocus to eir religion was too fast. I would’ve loved to see that reveal be explored at the beginning of the next book instead of this one.
All in all, Harder Than It Looks is in many ways a step up from the first book on a narrative and artistic level. I can’t wait to see what Wells’ is up to next with these characters.
Real Hero Shit: Harder Than It Looksis available wherever books are sold.
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