Beast of Borikén #1 Review: El Chupacabra Rises, Borikén Roars, and the Island Fights Back

WEPA! Now this is how you bring folklore back to the block with teeth, purpose, and a whole lot of righteous fury. Beast of Borikén #1 from Tiny Onion and Dark Horse Comics is not just a monster comic. Nah, mi gente, this is a full-on cultural warning siren wrapped in supernatural horror, political fire, family trauma, island pride, and the kind of mythic rage that makes you sit up like, “Oh… this ain’t just about claws in the dark.” Julio Anta and Daniel Irizarri come through with a debut issue that feels personal, urgent, and beautifully dangerous, taking the legend of el Chupacabra and ripping it away from cheap campfire gimmickry to restore it as something bigger, older, and far more meaningful.

The story centers on Loli Flores, a fierce Puerto Rican activist who is done watching the island get carved up, packaged, polished, and sold off to people who see Borikén as a luxury brochure instead of a living homeland. From the jump, Loli is not written like some generic “angry activist” stereotype. She has layers. She has a sharp tongue, a wounded heart, family obligations, and that exhausting burden of being the person in the room who keeps saying the uncomfortable truth while everybody else wants to smile for the ribbon-cutting photo. That’s what makes her compelling. She is not fighting because it is trendy. She is fighting because the land remembers, the people remember, and apparently, something much older than all of them remembers too.

Julio Anta’s script has that beautiful, combustible mix of modern social commentary and ancestral horror. The comic opens with the lingering trauma of storms, blackouts, hospital fears, and families trying to survive when systems fail them. Then, years later, the story shifts into public debate, media spin, and development politics, where Loli is on the front lines calling out the glossy lies behind resort projects and outside investment promises. The radio interview sequence is heavy with exposition, yes, but it works because it feels like the kind of argument many communities have had in real life: jobs versus displacement, “progress” versus preservation, opportunity versus exploitation. Anta does not whisper the issue’s politics. He puts them on the table, slams a cafecito next to them, and says, “Let’s talk.”

And then the monster comes!

But here’s the sauce: el Chupacabra is not treated like some random beastie thrown in to spice up a protest scene. The creature feels connected to the land, to history, to anger, and to protection. This is where Beast of Borikén starts cooking with real sazón. The comic understands that folklore is never just folklore. These stories carry fears, warnings, colonial scars, survival codes, and generational memory. By positioning el Chupacabra as a brutal protector tied to the island’s indigenous past, Anta and Irizarri take a legend that has been meme’d, mocked, and monster-of-the-week’d to death and give it back its dignity. It becomes less “spooky creature in the bushes” and more “the island has finally had enough.”

Daniel Irizarri’s artwork is absolutely essential to why this debut hits so hard. The pages feel lived in. Puerto Rico does not look like a postcard here. It looks like home: streets, hills, homes, construction sites, community gatherings, hospital rooms, protest spaces, all rendered with texture and specificity. Irizarri’s characters have real posture, real exhaustion, real attitude. Loli’s body language alone tells a story; she stands like somebody who has been carrying too much for too long but refuses to bend. When the issue moves into supernatural territory, Irizarri shifts the atmosphere without losing the grounded realism. The monster’s presence creeps in like humidity before a storm. You feel it before you fully see it. That is smart horror storytelling.

Patricio Delpeche’s colors bring a gorgeous emotional temperature to the book. The early storm-era scenes are cool, damp, and anxious. The daylight protest moments feel warm but tense, like a community event sitting on top of a powder keg. Then, when violence and mystery enter the frame, the palette darkens into something primal and unsettling. Delpeche does not over-slick the book. The colors breathe. They let the island feel lush, bruised, alive, and haunted all at once. That balance matters because this story needs beauty and menace dancing together like they both showed up to the same bomba rhythm and neither one plans to leave.

Lucas Gattoni’s lettering deserves a strong shoutout too, because this issue has a lot to juggle: radio dialogue, protest energy, family drama, big sound effects, creature tension, public speeches, and chaotic action. The lettering keeps everything clean and readable without flattening the momentum. The sound effects especially have bite. When machinery hits, when the ground rumbles, when the violence crashes into the page, Gattoni helps make it land. Letterers are the unsung percussionists of comics, and here the percussion is banging, papo.

What really makes this issue stand out is its emotional spine. Yes, this is about development and supernatural vengeance, but underneath all that, it is about family and helplessness. Loli’s anger does not come from nowhere. The scenes involving illness, hospitals, and the long shadow of past disaster give her activism a personal engine. She is fighting the system, but she is also fighting the fear that the people she loves will always be the ones paying the price when powerful people make decisions from comfortable rooms. That is the part that gives the comic its punch. The monster may have claws, but the real horror is abandonment. The real horror is watching communities get promised salvation by the same forces that profit from their vulnerability.

Now, keeping it 100 like a Brooklyn corner conversation: some readers looking for nonstop creature carnage might feel the issue takes its time getting to the full beast-mode chaos. This is a setup-heavy first chapter, and Anta is clearly building the political and emotional foundation before fully unleashing the mythology. But honestly? That patience is the point. The comic earns the monster by first making you understand what the monster is defending. Without that groundwork, el Chupacabra would just be a cool design jumping out of the trees. With it, the creature becomes a judgment call made by the land itself.

The backup feature, Seven Gates, adds extra value to the issue and gives the package that anthology-flavored Tiny Onion bonus energy. But make no mistake, the main attraction is Beast of Borikén, and it arrives with a voice that feels distinct, loud, and necessary. This is the kind of comic that knows horror is stronger when it has something to say. It is not just asking, “What if the monster is real?” It is asking, “What if the monster was never the thing we should have feared most?”

Beast of Borikén is a powerful debut with cultural fire in its belly and mud under its claws. It is supernatural horror with activist blood pressure. It is folklore sharpened into a machete. It is a story about Borikén refusing to be reduced to beachfront profit margins and developer champagne glasses. Anta, Irizarri, Delpeche, and Gattoni deliver a first issue that feels raw, relevant, and ready to roar. Tiny Onion and Dark Horse have something special here, and if this debut is the warning growl, then issue #2 might be the full moon howl. WEPA, this one got spirit, bite, and purpose. The Crusade Never Ends!

CRUSADERS SCORE:
4.5/5

Script / Co-Creator: Julio Anta
Art / Co-Creator: Daniel Irizarri
Colors: Patricio Delpeche
Letters: Lucas Gattoni
Tiny Onion Editor: Greg Lockard
Dark Horse Editor: Daniel Chabon
Cover A: Daniel Irizarri
Cover B: Naomi Franq
Cover C: Max Fiumara
Backup Feature: Seven Gates
Seven Gates Script: Justin Jordan
Seven Gates Art: Tony Akins
Seven Gates Letters: Aditya Bidikar
Publisher: Tiny Onion / Dark Horse Comics

In comic shops July 1st 2026