Witness Point #1 Isn't Clowning Around

Dan McMahonJuly 8, 2026

Let me tell you this first: I avoid watching movie trailers, reading previews, and anything that can ruin a story I am excited for. When I found out Witness Point was coming from Heath Corson and Soo Lee, I went FULL radio silence. Both Heath Corson‘s and Soo Lee’s work in the Minor Threats Universe with The Brood and Welcome to Twilight has been among my favorite comics of the last few years. Nathan Fillion was icing on the cake since he is like nerd royalty to someone like me. So I was lucky to read Issue 1 with no frame of reference. But I must also tell you that on the shelf next to me are 3 palettes of my favorite clown-face-paint grease, a clown skull, and other clown paraphernalia. So a murder mystery in a town best known as Circus City was 100% right up my alley. With a superbly likable lead, a fantastic setup, and some of the most spectacularly lively art, Witness Point is a 10/10 debut for a new series.

Witness Point welcomes you to Baraboo, a small Midwestern town nestled in the mountains of Wisconsin, home of the Ringling Brothers Circus headquarters and friendly neighbors that all know and trust each other… until it’s revealed that the town has been the dumping ground for every murderer, con-man, and crook in the Witness Protection program for the past forty years. “Witness Point,” as the previous marshal nicknamed Baraboo, has now become a hotbed of conspiracy, with every resident of this formerly sleepy town eyeing their neighbor with new suspicion, wondering who among them could secretly be the worst kind of criminal when a beheaded and behanded corpse shows up. Local sleuths put the town out as a hive of witness-protected people, which is like tossing gasoline onto a pile of dynamite for the otherwise lovely town.

The series starts out with a modern neo noir vibe with its small-town mystery at fire. But the Circus City angle is perfect for a comic to elevate it to something far off the normal three-ring affairs we are accustomed to with noir. It elevates the mundane to something almost fantastical because of everything that comes with the circus life. For example, there is a scene in which a tiger escapes and pins one of the local high school football players like he was nothing more than a mouse. As if on cue, the town’s tiger tamer appears to apprehend his tiger with his wife’s help. Even if the police were trying to handle it, it’s not a situation that could really happen elsewhere since Joe Exotic is still locked up. It’s a wonderful scene that nails the vibe of this comic.

The main character, Sheriff “Kite” Calhoon, is such an interesting lead while keeping a level of wholesomeness. He’s like if Luke from Gilmore Girls became a cop for the town, but I think there is much more going on there. There is a natural inclination to distrust a police officer in a small-town situation like this. But Kite makes you fall in love with him from his first interactions with the world. There is a running bit about his Cubs hat that everyone in town hates. I, too, am from an area where if you wear the wrong sports attire, the locals will happily call you out. It’s a nice piece of world-building that shows how the town interacts with one another in jovial jest.

Before I talk about the art, I need to highlight one character in particular. That character is Patches the Clown. I am his biggest stan already. When a second body is found, there is an incredible illustration by Soo Lee of the crowd as all mundane, washed-out people, but amongst them all is this fully done-up clown. It’s just one example of how the art paints the town as a larger-than-life community while still maintaining a small-town America vibe. There is an absurdity to a character in a murder mystery that only communicates via honking his horn to let the Sheriff know the Mayor wants to see him. The Mayor is a real clown. That’s not a joke. He’s a retired clown as well. He dispatches Patches to fetch the Mayor without muttering a single word, as if his people can understand what he is saying via honks.

Soo Lee is essentially at a god-level as an artist. She is doing double duty on the book as the colorist. I think her being the only artist on the book gives its design language her unique voice. There is so much to take in about her organic design of everyone in town while still capturing the elevated nature of being a circus show of a community. There is a vibrancy to the designs while never losing sight of the fact that this is the off-season home for so many of them (Other than my boy Patches, who is always a clown).

One character who stands out for that married nature of the wholesome and the absurd is the look for Mayor Smythe. We are introduced to him as he juggles in a tartan wing-collared suit in front of a painting of himself juggling as a clown. It’s such an apt visual of what this town is. There are so many characters that are living their everyday lives while their life’s work and passion is the circus. That is evident in how Soo Lee depicts them all, but this one stood out as the best example of the extraordinary design in this book.

Witness Point shows a quiet, absurd town on the brink of a powder-keg-level explosion with sincere characters, circus aesthetics, and art that ties it all together beautifully. It’s a brilliant first issue that draws you into its mystery and keeps you locked in for what’s to come. But it does make me want to learn to juggle, so beware of that side effect.