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Comics/Manga

Comic Book Review:
The Zombie: Simon Garth 1, 2, 3, 4

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TheZombie Issue One Zombos Says: Very Good

The Zombie (Simon William Garth) is a fictional supernatural character in the Marvel Comics Universe, who starred in the black-and-white horror-comic magazine series Tales of the Zombie (1973-1975), in stories mostly by Steve Gerber and Pablo Marcus. The character had originated 20 years earlier in the standalone story "Zombie" by Stan Lee and Bill Everett, published in the horror-anthology comic book Menace #5 (July 1953)  (from Marvel forerunner Atlas Comics. — Wikipedia)

The Zombie: Simon Garth, four issue series published under Marvel's MAX brand: Kyle Hotz, author and artist; Eric Powell, dialog assists; Dan Brown, colors; Warren Simons, editor. 

Issue One: Wrecks

Yes, it was a good thing they got him to the emergency room right away…No, I didn't know a cue ball could fit up there either.

The action begins immediately. One army chopper down in the woods and a car wreck on a quiet road send people on a collision course with mayhem. Cherry, a survivor of the car wreck, wakes up in the opening panels, calling for Liz. Cherry runs into the woods nearby looking for Liz, but finds two backwoods oafs with ill intent on their minds. She puts up a fight, but they knock her unconscious. Simon Garth enters the scene in a beautifully "lit" quarter-panel-plus that highlights his zombie-ness–rather majestically–as the plaid-dressed duo of Dumb and Dumber, obscured in shadow, are startled by his entrance. He tosses them around, picks up Cherry, and continues on his wandering way.

Cut to the crashed army chopper, one nonplussed scientist (we know he's a scientist because he's wearing his white lab coat) complaining on his cell phone that he's lost someone–namely Simon Garth, the carrier for the super secret zombie virus that everyone is now going to know about–and, oh look, one of the dead crash victims found the important blood sample-filled syringe sticking in his neck. No sooner than you can say "It's Zombie Time!" reanimated dead people start popping up. Both art and story work very well together, but army-sponsored zombie viruses, scientists who wear their white lab coats all the time on secret missions outside the lab, and mega-dangerous blood samples stored haphazardly in sharp syringes is simplistic scripting, abeit Hotz could be parodying the usual cinematic horror approach here. Whichever it may be, the flow of action moving around Simon Garth, as it escalates through dire events, is breezily paced. Enhanced by the black-inked lines and coloring highlights reflecting the emotions in the faces of the people he (and we) meet in this first issue, the story keeps you interested and in expectation for what happens next.

Sheriff Matt Haupt, sent to investigate the car wreck, finds the crashed helicopter. He doesn't know what he's stepped into, but he senses it's going to be messy. I bet Cherry will be surprised when she wakes up in the arms of Simon Garth.

…

Comic Book Review:
The Zombie: Simon Garth 1, 2, 3, 4Read More »

Comic Book Review:
Vincent Price Presents 1, 2, 3

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Vincent Price Presents Using the persona of famed horror actor Vincent Price to host a series of illustrated terror tales is a demanding challenge. While Price is noted for his appearances in movies that run the gamut of genre tastes, he never faltered in delivering a performance that was always interesting and entertaining. Even if the movie was not all that good, you could always count on Price to have fun with it, thereby making it fun for horror fans. But can his unique personality and image remain true when conjured up for Blue Water Comics' Vincent Price Presents? Or will we get a manga-ized, perhaps washed-out looking Price who chuckles over his ill-fitting lines of dialog, and squints his inky eyes across tedious panels of trite and recycled scare stories? Let's find out in our one-two punch review.

Issue 1: Welcome to the Family of the Night

Zombos Says: Good

 

Now, little boy. There's a vampire waiting especially for you. And he's very large. And he's very very hungry. First, he'll feed, and then he'll bottle what's left for cocktails.

Chad Helder, author; Ray Armenteros, story artist; Joel Robinson, framing artist; Malachi Sharlow, letterer; Darren G. Davis, editor.

Robinson's photo-realistic framing art is excellent for capturing the facial nuances of Price as he introduces, and gives parting commentary for, the story of a vampire utopia where humans, especially children, are a controlled food supply. We follow one child named R, who is unfortunate enough to be "adopted" by Mr. and Mrs. Clive, two vampires with a big appetite. Armenteros's story art splashes paint-like strokes between darkness and bold colors across panels of varying shapes and sizes. His facial close-ups of the Clives staring down at R as they put him to bed, and R staring up at them before they put the bite on him for a nightcap, are chilling. Helder's narrative is a sci-horror blend of vampiric blood-sucking terror and android saviors, generating a palpable fear of R's predicament of being trapped in a deadly situation with vampire "parents" bleeding him dry every night until he dies. This first issue is a good beginning for the series.

Issue 2: Orok the Neanderthal

Zombos Says: Fair

My brother you have come to join me.
I have been so lonely. Every day is an eternity.
Every night is a feast.

Chad Helder, author; Giovanni Timpano, story artist; Joel Robinson, framing artist; Malachi Sharlow, letterer; Jesse Heagy, colors.

Alas, poor Yorick, the momentum begun in issue one is not sustained in this story of lycanthropy and cavemen. The more photo-realistic looking Price, pondering homo sapiens while looking at a skull, introduces Helder's tale of primitive evil and early man's fight against it. There is very little dialog here–okay, they are cavemen–but the oversized panels broadcast the action with little subtlety. Timpano's artwork is adequate, but has no flair. It adds no emotional depth to Orok's personal loss, or the ferocity of his opponent, or the duality of good and evil in man's nature. Helder's lack of narrative description in these panels, combined with the little dialog there is, leaves us looking at them at face value, with no mythic insight, no clarity of the story's intent, and, more seriously, no tension to emotionally involve us.The B-movie twist-ending does not add to the story; instead, it serves to diffuse whatever mythological significance it may have contained. This second issue is not a good way to sustain the series.

Vincent Price Presents 3 Issue 3: A Whistle to Open Worlds

Zombos Says: Good

Beware, you are about to witness an All-American nightmare. Many readers will recognize the setting for this horror tale. It is called the microcosm, the world in miniature.

Chad Helder, author; Ray Armenteros, story artist; Joel Robinson, framing artist; Malachi Sharlow, letterer; Darren G. Davis, editor.

With editor Davis's return, this weird story of quantum-induced nightmare by Helder moves the series firmly back on track. Once again, Armenteros splashes his bold strokes across each page, barely keeping within the boundaries of his own panels. Creating a Van Gogh Starry Nightmare against a snowbound backdrop with his primitive swirlings, his visual momentum energizes Helder's bizarre predicament for African-American physicist Andrew Routledge. Tension and a building puzzle keep the reader involved until the last page, where the surprise explanation(?) awaits. Price's beginning and ending commentary is more playful and more important here, helping to explain the main narrative.

But exactly what is Helder getting at? That's the tough question, and one that elevates this issue to metaphorical implications beyond face value. Just what–or who–is the Shadow Man, and why does he cause the people in this Currier and Ives town to change into pop-eyed monsters that look vaguely familiar. Is Routledge trapped within his own reality or someone else's? And who is the man with the big smile who gave him the whistle to blow when the time was right? What the hell is going on? The folk-art styled illustration is a clue as both Helder and Armenteros work together to make this unique third issue more than frightfully good.

Interview: Peter Normanton
From the Tomb

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Peter Normanton is usually buried under, what with just completing The Mammoth Book of Best Horror Comics, and the rigors of publishing his From The Tomb magazine. But his love of the dissolute images and outrageous stories that spring from the unsavory pages of horror comics, to linger in our minds long after those pages have yellowed with age, makes him the kind of person we like to be interred with, too…for a little chat.

What is it about the horror comic medium that’s made you such an uber fan?

It goes back to my childhood. Like so many other kids I loved to be frightened by Doctor Who. I was convinced as a six year old the yeti was on the landing, stood outside my bedroom door. Twenty years later I had that rotten feeling all over again after watching Aliens at the cinema. I think I got my first collection of ghost stories when I was about nine, I loved that book. After that I was hooked.

I was always reading comics, mainly titles published over here in the UK such as TV21, Sparky, Beano and Jet. In 1972 Marvel Comics began reprinting the Silver Age Hulk, Spiderman and Fantastic Four in The Mighty World of Marvel. This was an incredible revelation because American comics were that rarest of treats; now I had the opportunity to keep up with these legendry stories. The love of horror, however, wouldn’t go away. It was stimulated still further by an afternoon programme with British comedian Bob Monkhouse, who was an avid comic book fan. He had in his hands several old horror comic books with the most lurid images you could imagine. They were ECs and I just had to have one of them. How, I had absolutely no idea. I wasn’t to know these titles had ceased to be published almost twenty years before. They appeared so taboo, offering the most disturbing imagery you could ever dream. I picked up a couple of DC’s one hundred page Unexpecteds, while the covers promised much the interior stories rarely satiated my lust for terror.

A few months later I came across Skywald’s Nightmare 17. It’s one of those moments I will never forget, catching sight of the cover through the newsagent’s window, with that half naked woman and the beast in the background. I had to ask for permission from my mum to make such a purchase. I still don’t know what I would have done if she had said no. I ran all the way back to the shop clutching my eighteen pence (the US equivalent would have been around 40 cents) dreading someone had already snapped it up, but no, it was still there. It seemed so adult and at last satiated my craving for that darkest kind of horror. Well almost; typically I had to have more, but those Skywalds would prove to be incredibly rare. Marvels line of black and white terrors would appear over here in the weeks that came and while I enjoyed them immensely nothing quite matched the feel of that issue of Nightmare.

In the years that followed my love of these titles has just grown. Towards the end of the 1980s, pre-Code comics became available in this country and those ECs finally came my way. Over the years horror comics have dared to unsettle and offer some amazing artistry. At their best they refuse to conform or offer any degree of compromise. I think those horror comics that attempt to be too mainstream are never going to survive. A good case in point is DC’s Hellblazer, which after twenty years is still as challenging as ever.

…

Interview: Peter Normanton
From the TombRead More »

Graphic Book Review:
The Mammoth Book of Best Horror Comics

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Almost side by side came the violence of the crime comic and the sugariness of teenage romance, then at the very end of the decade a handful of horror comics clawed their way onto the distributors’ schedules. Each spawned an abomination, the like of which had never before been seen in a comic book. Within a matter of years outrage followed on outrage as the contents of these so-called comics emerged to become the most notorious in the industry’s short-lived history. (Peter Normanton in The Mammoth Book of Best Horror Comics)

Zombos Says: Excellent

I am tired. The air is turning colder. My most singular experience is almost at an end. This is my last hope of conveying the enormity of the maddening horror, the numbing terror that has seized my heart, my mind. Sweat from fear makes it difficult to write, but I must…I must relate this most sordid of affairs, this break in the fabric of normalcy, of decency. I neither solicit your belief nor disbelief–you must listen, I beg you to listen, to heed what I say. My time grows ever shorter. He is coming closer…so damned close now. I must leave some record, some thoughts–if only I could focus better, calm my racing mind—some words to warn you before it’s too late, before he finds me…

“There you are!” said Zombos. “Time’s up. You’ve had it long enough.” He held out his hand.

“But I’m not done yet,” I pleaded. “Just another hour. One more hour, surely,” I begged.

“Nope. It’s my turn to read The Mammoth Book of Best Horror Comics. Next time, Zoc, listen to me when I tell you to order two copies.”

The grandfather clock in the hallway scolded me, or was it just striking the midnight hour? Was that the flittering of bat’s wings? Perhaps Zombos was right; maybe I had spent much too much time with these ghoulish, morbid horrors from the 1950s, 60s, and 70s? I reluctantly handed the book to Zombos. He cackled with glee and scurried back into the darkness to gnaw away on his prize–or so I imagined.

Edited by Peter Normanton (publisher of the essential From the Tomb magazine), the fifty crème de la crème horror comics and graphic stories presented within its moldering pages are enough–happily–to wake the dead and incite parents everywhere. Over four hundred pages of memorable atrocities, clawing up from the grave into your nightmares; it’s a dream come true for horrorheads everywhere!

Nightmare71 Describing how he became hooked on horror comics after seeing Sebastia Boada’s long-haired naked babe lounging with hairy ape-thing cover illustration for Skywald’s Nightmare No.17, in 1974, Normanton quickly jumps into the thick of it starting with gruesome gems from the 1940s and 50s in his section entitled The Dark Age of Comics. Although he writes “it wasn’t the bare flesh that got me excited , it was the beast looming in the background and the threat this moody scene invoked,” regarding that suggestive cover, it’s obvious his wife was looking over his shoulder when he wrote his remembrance; so I’ll cut him some geek-slack. It took me a few minutes to even notice the chained, uni-horned, beast in the moody background anyway.

Normanton gives a capsule history of this outlandish dark age, outlining publishers, titles, and the terminal impact notorious psychologist Dr. Frederick Wertham–“whose work maligning horror and crime comics appeared in an assortment of women’s journals during the 1940s and on into the early 1950s”–had on the demise of the lurid, but lucrative, bloody mayhem originally printed in four colors every month.

Each delectable story, reprinted here in ominous black and white, begins with the issue’s cover and background notes on the artist and writer (often the same person); a great way to give credit where it’s due (or the blame for that matter). For the horror comic reader, it’s information frightfully useful when compiling a must-read list of influential talents in the genre. Here you will run screaming from Don Heck’s Hitler’s Head in Weird Terror No.1, and sweat profusely along with Rudy Palais’ travelers in dire trouble in He, grippingly told in Black Cat Mystery No.38. Recurring macabre themes of the newly animated dead, the reluctantly dead, and the soon-to-be-dead, shadow dance their way among the graveyards, castles, and dark forests, partying it up with ghosts, ghouls, vampires, werewolves, and the depraved indifference exhibited by the usual neo-Nazis, scheming relatives, and whip-cracking, radiantly beautiful and well-endowed women with ill intent.

At their zenith, 1950’s horror comics contained torture, masochism, depravity, numerous dismembered and rotting parts, numerous rotting and decapitated heads, and numerous, radiantly beautiful and well-endowed women in various stages of distress (and undress). Monsters, zombies, witches, ghoulies and ghosties, leered, jeered and scared their way across the pulpy pages, leaving shock and delightfully gruesome death in their wake. Maybe Wertham wasn’t so off the mark after all?

–Hello, stop staring at that moody, chained hairy beast already and pay attention!–

In the next section, The Terror Returns, horror comics published under the dubious auspices of the Comics Code in the 1960s and 1970s are represented quite well, beginning with my all-time favorite, The Monster of Dread End, from Dell’s Ghost Stories No.1. Gone are the more graphically executed uses for a cat-o-nine tails and the colorful eye-dangling from socket, axe-split decapitated head–held by the hair–covers and plotlines. The hideous artwork of the 50s gave way to the toned-down, more suggestive and parent-friendly stylizations of Dell, Gold Key, Charlton, Marvel and DC. That is, until publisher James Warren realized the Comics Code didn’t apply to magazines. He used the black and white magazine format for more freedom in expressing horrific storylines graphically, and with the birth of his Creepy, Eerie, and Vampirella magazines, brought sophisticated adult terror to eager young, and old, readers, alarming everyone else in the process. Other publishers sought to emulate the format after the success of  Warren Publishing’s offerings, and soon the luncheonette and newsstand magazine racks were filled to the brim with imitators and innovators. As the competition heated up, so did the mature content, which reached its creative pinnacle in Skywald’s Horror-Mood  Psycho, Nightmare, and Scream magazines.

Normanton mixes in engrossing stories from Psycho and Nightmare, as well as Charlton’s Ghostly Haunts and Ghostly Tales, and adds a story from Eerie Publications’ Weird . Eerie Publications? They’re the ones your mom warned you about. With the nastiest covers and grindhouse-level storylines imaginable, their titles stand as the epitome of entertainingly tasteless horror-fare. Normanton tosses in one of their tamer offerings.

When reading this section of Mammoth’s Best Horror Comics, the differences between the Comics Code-restrained stories, and the unfettered black and white forays into terror, offer a fascinating comparison between the creative talents involved working under both circumstances. In the comic book format, more suggestive and imaginative excursions into the supernatural are the norm, while the black and white horrors in the larger print format relied on more visually-appalling panels, and a simpler, more direct approach in story-telling.

After the explosion of horror titles ended in the 1970s, Normanton goes on to the lean years of the 1980s and 90s, and more recent horror titles in the book’s last two sections entitled, The Faithful Few, and A New Millennium for the Macabre — the 21st Century, respectively. Having rekindled my love for illustrated horror within the last two years, these sections provide a wealth of reading-list material for me to explore. From Peter Von Sholly’s photo-montage remake of John Stanley’s The Monster of Dread End, to Cal McDonald: A Letter From B.S., these stories highlight the continuing sophistication in both artwork and writing that keep the illustrated-horror genre evolving and vibrant.

The Mammoth Book of Best Horror Comics is a treasure-trove that will provide hours of pleasure to the horror lover, and mortify just about everyone else. So  better read it late at night, when the rats in the walls have quieted down, and “For the love of God, Montressor!” no longer echoes loudly through the dark, fungi-soaked catacombs, but whispers oh-so-softly at the edges of your mind. Just make sure to buy two copies, so you’ll be left in peace when the walking dead come calling to read it, too.

Manga: Horror Books To Read

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"Are they gone yet?" asked Zombos, stretching his thin, long arm longer than he really should to reach the top of the Christmas tree. Precariously balancing the golden star of Bethlehem in one hand and the bright silver garland of hope in his other, he stood on tiptoes atop the ten-foot ladder, straining to reach the top of our vibrant green tree a scant few inches from his grasp. I suppose that's what faith is all about.

"No, not yet. They've started a bonfire on the north lawn," I said, looking out the window at the torch-wielding mob of angry holiday shoppers. They began chanting the same thing over and over again.

"What is that? What are they saying?"

"Give us more, give us more, give us more, and something about a dreidel," I told Zombos. "I think they want more gift ideas for the horror fans on their shopping list."

"Well, then, what are you waiting for? If they want more, give it to them."

"Alright, then. Manga will make them merry," I said, and got down to business.

Japanese horror manga, while similar to our comic book format, has been around for centuries. Heavily influenced in the past few decades by the atrocities of a world war, status competition, familial disaffection, and American culture, it's illustrations and storylines can be grotesque and arabesque, or comically naughty, or a mix of all three with a dash of irony.

UzumakiIn no other manga series is the grotesque and arabesque displayed so poetically than in Junji Ito's Lovecraftian-styled confection of spiraling, out of control horror, Uzumaki, Volumes 1, 2 and 3. Combining absurdity, whimsy, terror and alienation in three volumes, it stands out as one of the most entertainingly creepy and original series of manga stories currently available.

The town of Kurozu-cho is beset by spirals spinning out of control into the psyches and lives of the townspeople, bringing madness, other-worldly change, and twirling, gruesome death. Whence the spirals came, and how the town is slowly being driven to destruction, is a reading experience not to be missed. Uzumaki was turned into an equally disquieting film in 2000.

High school student Kirie Goshima is witness to the ever widening madness and physical change that affects her classmates and the town's buildings. In these pages you will find a heady blend of black and white illustration and bizarre events best read with all the lights on. In Ito's manga universe, the natural laws of physics and biology warp into chaos, transforming the lives of his ordinary characters, inch by inch, until their existence becomes the horror.

Tomie Ito has a fetish for beautiful, long-haired high school girls, and in Museum of Terror : Tomie, Volumes 1 and 2, he unleashes from his morbid mind his most beguiling black-haired beauty to terrorize her unending succession of admirers. It wouldn't be so bad if they would just stop murdering her and cutting her up into bloody chunks. She doesn't really seem to mind, however, because she keeps coming back. Again and again, she grows from a bit here and there back into her beautiful, long-haired, beguiling self, driving the men in her "lives" to obsession and murder. Again and again. She has a nasty habit of leaving them worse for wear, too. Given such a clever, natural plot-thread for sequelization possibilities, it's no wonder Tomie was turned into a series of films.

Museum3 In Museum of Terror: The Long Hair in the Attic, Ito turns his fancy to another long-haired beauty named Chiemi. When she returns home with a broken heart, rats in the attic take a liking to her. Actually, to her hair more than her, but what's a girl to do? Before she can cut it into a shorter doo, her hair has other plans. This title story is just one of many that places high-school girls and boys in various predicaments of terror.

Where Junji Ito's normal characters suffer from peer relationships gone sour, bullying, and the pressures of attaining social status or losing it, Hideshi Hino creates dysfunctional families that are like the Addams Family in the bizarro world. It's just his families have no redeeming values whatsoever.

Hino said it was after reading Ray Bradbury's The Illustrated Man that he felt the need to combine horror with a sense of fairy tale. This led him to mix monstrous birth defects, other-worldly transmogrifications, and hideously deformed characters with Japanese folktales, producing uniquely unsettling, culture-transcending stories. His characters are often trapped in a mad world of disease, insanity, and demons, and none of his characters ever start off normal.Lullabies

In his Lullabies From Hell collection of stories, he draws himself as the young narrator in A Lullaby From Hell, introducing himself as a mangaka (manga author) who is obsessed with terrible, unmentioned things peeking just above the surface of normalcy. Soon, as things both living and dead bleed into his manga mind, he collects their rotting parts in big glass jars so he can stare in admiration at them for hours on end, while dreaming of monsters and demons from hell that would, at his bidding, devour and torture people–especially those that abuse him. Needless to say, reading Hideshi Hino requires a strong stomach and a sense of black humor. His stories are like crushing a mucous-filled bug on your arm: an icky, but oddly exhilarating feeling at the same time.

In Zoroku, the hapless title character yearns to draw colorful pictures, but evil villagers make fun of him… and his condition. It seems that a little rash has turned to a boil, and a boil to many, and many to something much, much worse. Poor Zoroku becomes covered with a "colorful purulence," and the villagers and their children drive him away to solitude, deep into the forest by a strange lake. Unfortunately for him, the purulence gives off an odor that would curl paint, and his boils ooze so badly, maggots infest them in the hundreds. The story does have a happy ending, though, sort of.

Redsnake Any hardcore horror fan would love a copy of Lullabies and his Hino Horror 1: The Red Snake. Here, the younger member of a truly unsavory family is trapped by a dark forest that never lets him leave, and a house that contains an ancient mirror, behind which lies a maze of long corridors filled with demons from hell. And you thought the commute to work was bad. Grandma thinks she's a chicken and lives in a nest of twigs, Grandpa has puss-filled warts that he likes having squeezed, and dad collects bugs, lots of bugs. All hell breaks loose when a crack in the mirror lets the demons out. Just make sure you don't eat before reading this one.

No manga library would be complete without the engrossing The Drifting Classroom, Volumes 1-11, by Kazuo Umezu (also made into a 1987 film). Sho has a fight with his mom, and when both wish the other would never come back, the universe obliges them. Unfortunately for Sho's classmates and teachers, the universe includes the entire Yamato Elementary School along with him. What follows is something like Stephen King's The Mist, but with kids.

In Volume 1, the realization of what happened slowly sinks in and the hunt for food begins. Sho takes the leadership role as the struggle to survive against the desolate world they find themselves in butts up against the growing panic quicklyDriftingclassroom setting in, pitting kid against kid and teacher against teacher. Be warned: kids and teachers drop like flies in this manga. While there is little gory illustration, Umezu keeps constant tension going from panel to panel, and the frying relationships between everyone moves the story at a fever pitch. There is a real sense of horror here as estrangement from their normal life and parents leaves the kids in shock and disbelief, and the teachers without a clue as to what to do.

In subsequent volumes, more about the world they find themselves is learned, but food and water is running out, teachers are in despair and committing suicide, or murder, and the lunch guy everyone loved turns into the nastiest SOB in the school–with a gun. Then Umezu tosses in carnivorous monsters, insane adults, and a mother's love that overcomes time and space to save her son. He also makes sure the school's only 230 IQ geek explains exactly what happened. Once you start reading, you won't be able to put it down, so if you buy this as a gift, I beg you, don't open the covers–or just order doubles to play safe.

Remember that manga is usually presented in the Japanese format. While it's translated into English, you start reading from the back of the book, right page first, then left page. And on each page, read the panels from right to left, too. It takes a little getting used to, but you'll catch on quick. I invite readers to add their recommendations for other great manga gifts in the comments section.

Comic Book Review:
Papercutz Tales From the Crypt 3

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Ilozzoc zomboscloset It's black Thursday here at the mansion and no shopping in sight. Thanksgiving dinner was going well until Frederico Frunken started reminiscing over his paprika hendl. Cousin Cleftus popped his monocle across the table and angrily waved a drumstick at Frederico. You can take the man out of politics, but you can't take politics out of the man. I really should be writing up some reviews. I'm running behind as usual. 03:00 PM November 22, 2007 from the webCrypt3comicov

Papercutzcryptkeeper1950 @zomboscloset: Speaking of reviews, Zoc, Papercutz' Tales From the Crypt issue 3 is out. You've been kind of slipshod on the last two issue's reviews, so maybe you could put more focus on this one and be more serious? 03:05 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Ilozzoczomboscloset @cryptkeeper1950: Not you again. Stop bothering me. I'll get to it when I get to it. Oh, damn, Cousin Cleftus just threw the drumstick at Frederico. Thank god Zombos's head was in the way. Lord, not the cranberry sauce, too! I've got to go! 03:07 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Papercutzcryptkeeper1950 @zomboscloset: All I'm saying is if you're goin' to be a serious reviewer you really need to stop playing around and get serious. Look at me: I'm dead, but I'm still serious. That's commitment. Even if Papercutz' insists on watering me down into a few slapstick chuckles for their 'tweener audience. I feel your pain, but unfortunately I'm stuck with Salicrup as editor. 03:08 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Ilozzoczomboscloset @cryptkeeper1950: Finally, everyone is calmed down and enjoying Chef Machiavelli's scrumptiuous desserts. Speaking of just deserts, I will say Stefan Petrucha's story, "Slabbed," captures a bit of the old comeuppance magic. The story has a great balance between art and script, and it's always fun to see a bully get his due. Don Hudson's more traditional superhero-art style works quite well here.Nice to get away from that Archie comics, manga style that stifles the series. I would have liked to see more embellishment in the artwork, especially the backgrounds, though. Every story in each issue always looks like it's being rushed, especially when you consider the great talent involved. 03:12 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Papercutzcryptkeeper1950 @zomboscloset: Yeah, we snuck that one past Salicrup when he was on vacation. What did you think of A Murderin' Idol? 03:14 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Ilozzoczomboscloset @cryptkeeper1950: Predictable story: wannabe rock star finds primordial book of spells to conjure pint-sized demon requiring human sacrifices to grant bigger and bigger wishes. Not really all that bad, but Todd needed to add zest into his dialog and setups. I mean, Slymon Bowel? I suppose a younger audience might find that witty. A comic take on American Idol needs more panache than potty-named monikers.As for the art, I expected Betty and Veronica to pop-up in a panel any moment. Mannion does a nice job with the panel movement, but there's that rushed, two-dot nose and eyes look butting up against the borders on every page again. The chunky demon works; mean, yet still funny in appearance. And the coloring in each panel is super across both stories, but I think Rick Parker would have been a better choice to draw that one.  He's doing a great job with the ghoulunatics sequences.Even Salicrup is writing better lead-ins to each story; but those puns are torture. 03:17 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Papercutzcryptkeeper1950 @zomboscloset: You're preachin' to the choir there, my friend. You'd never guess I went to Harvard with him writing my lines. 03:18 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Billythepuppet_2 billythepupfromsaw @zomboscloset: What's real torture, Zoc, is you not reviewing Saw IV. I'm very disappointed in you. You have failed to live up to your own self-worth. I must teach you the value of being a reviewer. Maybe by poking your eyes out with rusted springs you will come to appreciate how you've left your own readers sightless by not reviewing my never-ending, bloody torture franchise. McDonald's didn't put me in their Happy Meals because of you, Zoc. They were going to put your review on the side of the paper bag, along with a shot of me stretching Ronald McDonald's feet even bigger than they are now. But no. No Zoc review, no cute little Billy the Puppet happy meal. No colorful torture toys for little girls and boys because you couldn't live up to your potential. I'm very, very, very disappointed in you. 03:19 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Ilozzoczomboscloset@billythepupfromsaw: Bite me, sawdust! Nobody's got a hand up my butt telling me what to do or say. I review what I want, when I want. 03:21 PM November 22, 2007 from the web


Papercutzcryptkeeper1950 @zomboscloset, @billythepupfromsaw: Say, wait a minute: we could do a gag in issue 4 with me pedaling around on a tricycle with red targets painted on my face.  Damn, I've got to call Salicrup! He'll love it. We could call me Billy Baloney and–damn, I think Pee Wee Herman  used that one. Say, wait a minute: I could dress up like Pee Wee Herman with targets on my face doing a parody of Billy the Puppet doing a parody of Saw IV, and–dialing Salicrup now, gotta go! 03:22 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Jerrymahoneyjerrymahoneytime @zomboscloset: Technically speaking, the hand is up the back. Can we keep it clean here folks. I see no reason to start flaming each other. 03:23 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Veronicaarchiesgirlveronica @zomboscloset: Just what did you mean by your statement above, Zoc? Betty and I wouldn't be seen dead in a horror comic. Well, maybe dead, but, say, we could be zombies! I always thought Jughead would make a great zombie. Archie is too uptight for that kind of stuff. Ooh, dialing Jughead now! Seeya. 03:26 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Papercutzcryptkeeper1950 @archiesgirlveronica: Hot chick zombies! I love it! Message me after midnight to discuss. 03:28 PM November 22, 2007 from the web

Graphic Book Review: Zombie Tales Vol. 1

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Zombos Says: Very Good

No other horror subgenre elicits more fodder for cinema than those nihilistic automatons of sheer irrational fright and disgust. Whether born of thumping voodoo drums, cosmic radiation, or the crisp tinkling of test tubes, the walking dead have brought metaphorical life to many cinematic, philosophical, theological, and fictional works. No other unreal monster instills such chills and thrills as a shambling or sprinting—and badly decomposing—undead aunt, uncle, or significant other that has eyes and teeth only for you. From social commentary to gore, zombies are the cat’s meow when it comes to biting allusive storytelling and visceral visuals combined.

Boom! Studios’ Zombie Tales Volume One takes full advantage of this ironic oasis of socially  relevant dead people by collecting, into a nicely-sized book, stories that run the gamut of zombiedom motifs, including loss of identity, religious dilemma, and gruesome humor. It’s a rare treat to find a collection that provides stimulating horror entertainment across every story. The Walking Dead trades come to mind as one of the few that can do that. Zombie Tales Volume One accomplishes the same feat, and while each story is not above average, many are, and all are competently good.

My favorite would have to be Daddy Smells Different. That foreboding title aside, one of the challenges in doing a short graphic story is to provide enough build-up, within the limited span of panels, to enable an effective ending; one that will leave you thinking—and feeling—a little off the well-trodden trail of typicality. Writer and artist, John Rogers and Andy Kuhn, create a 1950’s-style tale of terror with their snappy narrative, told in the first person by a little boy who goes through a more challenging change than puberty. It’s poignant, a little sad, and provides a kicker ending that leaves you uncomfortable. Both artwork and narrative work horrifyingly well together and capture a bit of that old EC Horror Comics magic.

I, Zombie:Remains of the Day, a three-part story written by Andrew Cosby and illustrated by three capable artists in their different styles, is a sublime dip into the bizarro world of zombie humor. Another tale told in the first person narrative style, it depicts the trials and tribulations of one poor dead-head whose hunger goes deeper than just sweetmeats. Here, loss of identity becomes more replacement by a different one; one you definitely could say is a life-style change, or maybe “dead-style” would be more accurate. With a little tongue in cheek dialog, and decomposing anatomy, the story provides a happy ending only possible in your zombie imagination. One amusing scene has zombie bunnies poised for mayhem. It reminded me of a similar, albeit much more serious scene in Kim Paffenroth’s Dying to Live novel.

Another three-part story by writer Keith Giffen, and artist Ron Lim, is a darkly-humorous, more philosophical exploration of a zombie mind slowly becoming dissolute; a once-living personality slowly dissolving into nothingness. Parallels can be drawn to the reality of alzheimer’s disease as the real horror of becoming a zombie is explored in Dead Meat: the loss of one’s self, one’s uniqueness.

Religious dogma is the underpinning for The Miracle of Bethany, written by Michael Alan Nelson and drawn by Lee Moder. I recall one reviewer mentioning this story could be construed as blasphemous in its use of Lazarus as Zombie O, but fiction can never be blasphemous; only reality can. It’s a story that looks at how a miracle can become a curse if the spirit—and flesh—is weak. We all stand naked in the Garden of Eden after all.

Religion also plays into Zarah’s decision-to-be-made For Pete’s Sake. Writer Johanna Stokes and artist JK Woodward explore that decision—how long do you hold out hope for the one you love in the face of despair—before you can move on with your dramatically altered life? Here, the zombie apocalypse has created a new culture of “them and us”, with people moving from building to building across foot-bridges built from roof-top to roof-top, while the ravenous, ungodly zombies walk streets below. Life goes on, as best it can. I can think of some ungodly places on earth now that closely parallel the unreal world Zarah finds herself in. What would your decision be?

While there are other rewarding stories in this engrossing anthology, the last one will leave you with a bitter taste in your mouth as another, once happy, little boy fights to find his way back home in A Game Called Zombie. This one hearkens back to The Twilight Zone, but there is no Rod Serling here to neatly tie things up. Instead, little Travis must contend with zombies that no one else can see; worse yet, they can see him. Is he hallucinating from the onset of schizophrenia? Where did his dad go? Whatever you do, don’t open your eyes. What was chasing you is now standing in front of you.

Comic Book Review:
Papercutz Tales From the Crypt 2

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Tftc2 Zombos Says: Good

“What the hell?” It was three a.m. in the morning. I woke up from a fitful sleep because someone was banging on my bedroom window. I threw the bedsheets aside and reluctantly got out of bed.

“Finally! Boy, you sleep like the dead,” rasped the Crypt-Keeper as I opened the window. “Hey, watch it down there!” He was standing on the top rung of a too short ladder. Three stories below, the Old Witch and the Vault-Keeper were trying to hold the ladder steady. “Bungling dolts! And they wonder why I always get top billing.”

“Look, if this is about that review I did for issue one—” I started saying.

“Tsk, tsk, a bloated corpse under the bridge, Zoc, bloated corpse under the bridge. Though the boys at Papercutz were not happy. Not happy at all. Lucky for you I convinced them to put down their torches and go home.

“Then who’s that?” I pointed to a man standing at the foot of the ladder, holding a flaming torch high in one hand and flipping me the bird with the other.

“Oh, he’s just one of the artists. They get so temperamental, you know. Look, Zoc, baby, you’ve simply got to check out our second issue. We’ve—” The Crypt-Keeper swayed to the left, then swayed back. “Will you idiots hold the ladder steady!” he yelled. “And you with the
torch, why don’t you put it down and help them? Don’t just stand there! I’m working here!”

The man dropped the blazing torch and quickly grabbed hold of the ladder.

“For hell’s sake, where was I?” asked the Crypt-Keeper.

“You were selling me on reading issue two of Papercutz’ Tales From the Crypt.”

“Oh, right. Look, Zoc, I’m not getting any younger. This is my last chance at a comeback. Would it kill you to just take a look?” He handed a copy of issue two to me.

“Well, alright, but couldn’t this have waited until—say, what’s burning?”

We looked at each other, then down below. The ladder was on fire.

“Jimminy crickets!” yelled the Crypt-Keeper. He lost his footing and fell. Lucky for him, he fell on top of the artist, the Old Witch, and the Vault-Keeper, so that helped cushion his long fall.

“Well then,” I mumbled as I closed the window. I sat on the edge of my bed, now wide awake, and started reading Papercutz’ Tales From the Crypt No. 2.

Right off the bat I’ll say it’s a giant mausoleum step up from issue one. I wondered if that wonderfully ghoulish ghoul on the cover was indeed a giant—you don’t see many giant ghouls attacking apartment buildings—but no, just artistic license, though it does tie into the lead story.

Instead of three short stories like issue one, there are two longer stories. Both offer up just deserts endings, but the first hearkens back to a 1960’s-styled social theme, while the second is a more daring take on a contemporary social reality that perplexes the sane minds among us. And there’s a frightfully funny letters page, The Crypt-Keeper’s Corner, that’s very entertaining.

In The Tenant, writer Neil Kleid and artist Steve Mannion whip up an old-fashioned tale that has the long-gone tenants of cheapskate landlord James Winchell’s slummy property at 666 Colt Street griping for better service. And their bitching is enough to raise the dead.

The flow of panels is good, and the witty story fits the art style of heavy black lines well. With more pages to flesh out the mood and pacing, it serves up a little taste of the original Crypt-Keeper’s sense of irony without being too morbid or gross. The encounter with one dead resident in the basement is a highlight and handled with lots of energy.

One aspect of a comic book story often overlooked is the lettering job. Mark Lerer’s work effectively conveys the emotions and tone of James Winchell’s comeuppance along with the illustrations. Now if they could get the Crypt-Keeper’s loony introductions into his same lettering style, that would be super.

Even the Crypt-Keeper’s puns are better this time around, and more care is taken with his zany antics. The Crypt-Keeper’s Corner letters page is hilarious, and brings back a strong element that made the original comic so enjoyable to read. In this issue, the gasps of disbelief regarding issue one, sent in by fans of the original EC Tales From the Crypt, are priceless, along with the Crypt-Keeper’s responses.

In the second story, The Garden, writer Fred Van Lente and artist Mr. Exes combine to jolt a dumb sap who bought into the ‘deaths for paradise’ insanity, which motivates many suicide bombers, into an unexpected reality. The story has a surprising depth, and Mr. Exes’ art, a heady mix with touches of Max Fleischer kinesiology, Gil Kane, an acid trip, and manga blended madly together, jolts us as well as Richard, the guy who thought he was in paradise, when he discovers what he really got himself into. There’s a tad more gruesome in this one, too.

Mr. Exes artistic style grated on some readers of the first issue, myself included, but I must admit that given the right kind of story his panels carry a lively charge that moves beyond conventional boundaries. Just pick up Abra Cadaver: The Afterlife Adventures of Harry Houdini No. 1 and you will see what I mean.

“What are you reading at this ungodly hour?” asked Zombos, coming into my room.

“Here, you will enjoy it.” I handed him the issue. He took it and sat down in the settee by the window.

“Oh, so that’s why the Crypt-Keeper, the Old Witch, the Vault-Keeper, and some idiot trying to put out a fire on a burning ladder woke me up. I thought I was dreaming. Let’s wake up Chef Machiavelli and have him bring up a pot of hot coffee.”

“Capital idea,” I said and rang his bedroom. It was the common lot this morning for everybody.

Comic Book Review:
Papercutz’ Tales From the Crypt 1

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Zombos Says: Fair

Welcome, dear readers, to another unbelievably gruesome tale for your morbid delight. Pull up a coffin and sit for a spell, won’t you? Tonight, we look at another vain and feeble attempt to resurrect the dead. What’s that you say? No, it’s not good old Frankenstein up to his old tricks, nor voodoo zombies dancing in the moonlight. It’s more diabolical than that! It’s Papercutz’ Tales From the Crypt, Issue Number One!

The office is quiet. The clock on the desk shows midnight as the sleepy-eyed artist finishes his work. Reaching for his long cold cup of coffee, he accidentally spills red ink across the freshly drawn page.

“Damn,” he says out loud, but there’s no one to hear. Or is there?

“Hahahahaah!” cackles a mucous-filled throat.

“Who’s that! Who’s there?” says the artist, jumping out of his chair.

“Only us,” replies another voice, as if clogged with fresh earth from a newly dug grave.

Gasp! The artist trips over his chair as he spins around. Standing behind him are two figures. They glare at him from the darkness his desk lamp can’t reach. Their clothes hang in tatters, and moist earth drops in little clumps from their rotted limbs.

“Oh my god, you…you’re…” The artist staggers backward in disbelief, raising his hands in horror.

“Yeah, I’m Feldstein, and he’s Johnny Craig. Look, we’re not entirely happy with what your doin’ with our baby, the Crypt-Keeper.” Feldstein’s finger drops off as he points vigorously at the artist. “Not again, damnit! Now where did it go?” He motions to Johnny Craig while he looks for his finger.

“What he said,” snarls Craig. “I mean, just look at that artwork for the first story, Body of Work. Are you kidding me? Jack Davis was so upset he went to pieces. Wally Wood’s still back at the cemetery trying to put him together. Just look at these colors; bright, cheerful? And what the hell do you think you’re drawing, a Picasso? And don’t get me started on that storyline. Horror writer my ass! I’ll admit it’s kind of witty, and the tone of the story and art style work fairly well together, but that ending? C’mon, how original to use the old PG-standby, heart attacks. These are fiends, man! Thirsting for blood!”

“But I didn’t draw the first story; I drew the second one, For Serious Collectors Only,” pleaded the artist.

Feldstein stands up, grabs the tape dispenser off the desk, and tapes his finger back onto his hand. Then, in a fit of inspiration, he staples it for good measure.

“There, that’s not going anywhere now. Now what was I saying? Oh, yeah. The Crypt-Keeper may be demented, but he’s still educated. Who wrote those godawful word balloons for him anyway? You’d think he was a bit comic doing a dead vaudeville shtick the way he talks. Where’s the puns, the biting sarcastic wit? From Ralph Richardson to this? I can’t believe it. Even Kassir did a better job.”

The artist cowered. “That’s Salicrup. He did it. You can’t blame me for any of that. I told him it was too juvenile, too pedestrian. All I did was draw the second story.”

“That second story’s a doozy, too. It’s “250% more cursed” is right. How many times have I seen comic book stories about nerdy comic book collectors who live in their mom’s basement? Gee, let me count those times on my fingers. Damn, ran out of fingers!”

Once more, Feldstein’s overly dramatic hand gestures send another finger flying through the air. His pinky lands in the artist’s coffee cup.

“Gross,” says the artist, pushing the cup away in disgust.

“Damn, not again!” says Feldstein, reaching for the tape dispenser and stapler.

“He’s right,” says Craig. “These stories are so overly done and so predictable. Where’s the witty but ironic endings, the twist of the fickle finger of fate? Tsk, tsk.”

“There’s no unique Tales From the Crypt look, either,” says Feldstein. “No bold ink lines, or saturated morose colors, or salient looks of dread on fear-stricken faces. Where are the tombs, the crumbling cemeteries, the rotting zombies? Is this the best you got? All I’m sayin’ is show the respect due, that’s all. Don’t just throw anything together and call it Tales From the Crypt. I want to see more effort put into the second issue or else.”

Feldstein leans forward to emphasize his “or else.” As the artist frantically jumps backward to avoid the snarling corpse, he trips over his own two feet, and cracks his head open on the edge of the heavy steel desk. His blood pours out from the large gash in his skull, mixing with the red ink already spilled.

“Damn, didn’t see that coming,” says Craig. “His artwork wasn’t that bad, either.”

Both Craig and Feldstein hurriedly stagger off. Light begins to enter the office windows. The clock on the desk shows 6 A.M., the time the artist usually goes to Starbucks for his morning cup of coffee. He won’t be going to Starbucks today.

Well, dear readers, the poor artist has learned, only too late, that the comic book business can be murder. Perhaps he’ll be drawing a pair of wings next. Hehehehehehe.

Interview: Sight Unseen

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Sight Unseen book cover Zombos Says: Good

Robert Tinnell and Bo Hampton’s graphic novel, Sight Unseen, is an American Gothic story that, in true style, keeps the evil all in the degenerate family. With tight pacing, shadowy, emotive art panels that read like a cinematic storyboard, and a premise that doesn’t overwhelm the story but allows it to unfold, it delivers a tidy mix of eerie imagery and believable-within-context situations; along with a damned, J-Horror-styled spirit that simply loves to hurt people.

While seeing dead people through special optics like eyeglasses has been done in print and film before, that’s not the focus of the story. It just so happens that Frank Byron, blinded in a lab explosion, seizes the “opportunity” to explore a different type of sight; one based on his observation that his seeing-eye dog apparently sees things that no human can see. Dead things.

In the course of his experiments he distances himself from his daughter while becoming closer with the dead. But the dead are not entirely the focus of the story, either, except for one dead person in particular, still residing at The Birches Estate, recently put up for sale. She’s quite a handful as Frank gravitates to exploring the mystery with his newfound second sight when people start disappearing.

The artwork and story work well together, and the heavy line strokes combine with the shading and coloration across panels to sustain a morosely detailed and creepy sense of dread.

I met with director and author Robert Tinnell at the 2007 Monster Bash Convention, and took the opportunity to ask him a few questions.

How did Sight Unseen come about?

I met Bo Hampton at Wizard in Philly and we clicked. He read The Black Forest on the plane on the ride home and then called me and asked if I was interested in collaborating. I’m still trying to figure out why! He had ideas – the notion of a blind guy who could see ghosts.  I had a story involving the haunted house – and wanted to do the southern gothic thing – and we just sort of married the stuff…[Note: The last few pages in the book are devoted to the collaborative creative process involved in bringing Sight Unseen to print.]

With much of your creative work done in a horror vein, what is it about the genre that motivates you?

I think there are a number of factors, and while it may be embarrassing, there’s no denying nostalgia’s influence. Working in the genre brings to mind the things that inspired me in the first place – and the accompanying emotions. Of course, there’s more to it than that. In general, I think horror allows us to explore other aspects of life – sex and death are certainly primary examples. I mean – how can you watch Invasion of the Body Snatchers and think it simply exists to try and scare you? Of course, I do love trying to scare people. Always have.

Tell us about your monsterkid background and when the horror bug first bit you.

I remember seeing an ad for Hammer’s Kiss of the Vampire – it was going to be on CBS late night television, and I was immediately drawn to it – but forbidden to watch!  Later it was Dark Shadows and the Hammer films – still later the classic Universals. And in the seventies I was heavily into horror film fandom – did my own fanzine. I guess it was a cumulative effect of all that stuff…

Sightunseen02 Did your directing experience influence your writing in The Black Forest, The Wicked West, and Sight Unseen?

Not so much on TBF but definitely on the latter two. On TWW the book itself is certainly a rumination on film – at least one aspect of the book is. As far as Sight Unseen goes, I think even more as I was definitely tapping into cinematic methods of eliciting scares – and Bo was doing the same thing – drawing on his experience as a storyboard artist.

What was it like directing Frankenstein and Me?

Truly the best and worst of times. My personal life was in great upheaval. I don’t think the film is what it should have been – and I blame myself. But on the other hand, I did get to make it and did get to pay tribute – however flawed – to all those films and people who inspired me. Just standing around on the Brides of Dracula set and the Night of the LIving Dead location (I should clarify – recreations used for the film) was fantastic. And there are moments in the film – like when the kids are watching Dark Shadows that are very rewarding for me personally. I just wish I could go back and redo it.

Which horror films are your favorites and why?

The scary ones! Although I am partial to some that aren’t so much scary as they are beautiful to look at or thought-provoking. But here’s a partial list – The Uninvited: a ghost story that really delivers the chills.  It’s a very evocative little film – and I like the fact it doesn’t try too hard. The Innocents: a ghost story that’s about something, elegantly photographed, eerie in its simplicity. I’m a big fan. Night of the Living Dead: verite horror – this is a text book case about how to scare – and not because of the gore – which is actually the weakest part of the film. The Horror of Dracula – scary, sexy, economical, elegant, beautiful to look at, brilliantly directed. What more can I say? The Exorcist: you don’t have to like it – but you have to respect it. Scary because it takes its time, building its case, so that once you are confronted with the actual supernatural events you have no choice but to believe. The Old Dark House: The original James Whale version – scary and fun and sadly under-appreciated.

The list goes on and on – and my hands hurt from typing – so I’ll just note: THE CAT PEOPLE, FRANKENSTEIN, THE INVISIBLE MAN, DRACULA, DRACULA’S DAUGHTER, SON OF DRACULA, THE WOLF MAN, CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN, BRIDES OF DRACULA, DRACULA, PRINCE OF DARKNESS, THE DEVIL RIDES OUT, FRANKENSTEIN CREATED WOMAN, FRANKENSTEIN MUST BE DESTROYED, QUATERMASS FILMS, SUSPIRIA, DAWN OF THE DEAD – whew – the list is literally exhaustive…

What current and future projects are you working on?

I am writing two graphic novels – EZ Street for artist Mark Wheatley, and Bo and I are co-writing and he’s drawing Demons of Sherwood. I just finished the graphic novel, Eagle: Legacy, for Neil Vokes and once he’s done drawing that he starts our monthly comic, THE VOICE – which is my first foray into Mexican horror. I’m writing a big horror adventure screenplay and at the same time writing another more mainstream screenplay. After that I’m going to adapt Lee Maynard’s novel Crum – which is a brilliant book about Appalachia. I’m preparing to direct the movie version of my graphic novel, Feast of the Seven Fishes…I’m sure I’m forgetting something…Oh yes – writing the book, Jump Cuts, with Mark Clark – which we hope will serve as a interesting study of how horror movies have tried to scare us…

What’s the one question you’d love to be asked, and what’s your answer?

What are some dream projects?

I’d love to direct the movie version of The Living and the Dead, the graphic novel I wrote with Todd Livingston that Micah Farritor drew. I’d love to adapt Fritz Leiber’s Conjure Wife, though apparently that will never happen thanks to some convoluted rights’ issues. Tim Lucas wrote a marvelous novel, The Book of Renfield, that would be a joy to adapt as a screenplay.

Manga Review:
Hideshi Hino’s Lullabies From Hell

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HideshiHino

Zombos Says: Excellent

Hideshi Hino's Lullabies From Hell is an essential tankōbon in any horrorhead's manga library. Hino is a queer duck, to be sure, and often incorporates much of his personal experience into his bizarre, visually disturbing stories.

According to an interview he gave for The Comics Journal, it was after reading Ray Bradbury's The Illustrated Man that he felt the need to combine horror with a sense of fairy tale. This led him to mix monstrous birth defects, other-worldly transmogrifications, and hideous characters—inside and out—with Japanese folktales, producing uniquely creepy and culture-transcending stories of terror.

There's a whimsical grotesqueness in Hino's artwork: he fills his panels with people endowed with oversized, misshapen heads staring madly at the reader with bulging, blood-shot eyes filled with large, zigzagging veins. All is definitely not right in his world, as body parts, disgusting creatures, blood and corruption—both physical and psychological—splash all over normal scenes of home, work and play.

In the opening story, A Lullaby from Hell, he introduces himself as a mangaka (manga author), who is obsessed with those terrible, unmentioned things peeking from just below the surface of normalcy. He describes his fascination with horror came at an early age, nurtured by a demented mother who tormented him, a father he rarely saw who worked at the factory right behind his house, and his abusive "horrible Yakusa" brother.

Soon, as things both living and dead bleed into one another in his mind, he begins to collect their parts in big glass jars so he can admire them for hours on end. In his admiration, he dreamed dreams of monsters and demons from hell that would, at his bidding, devour and torture people, especially those that abused him.

After being humiliated and abused once too often, he discovers he has a unique power: the ability to kill people with his drawings. And not just kill them, but mangle them, mash them, and do very nasty things to them. All because he could will it to be so. 

In the next story, Unusual Fetus—My Baby, once again he is dreaming up a nightmare. He imagines his soon-to-be-born son as a "grotesque lizard" thing. Since this is a horror story after all, we get what he dreams up. In this nasty tale of phylogeny recapitulates ontogeny gone haywire, his son is born a lizard-like thing with an unusual appetite that is not satisfied with baby formula. For a while, our horror writer uses this unfortunate event to his advantage, and successfully sells his impossible story. But fate always intervenes, and soon what is abnormal for him is normal for all.

In another story, Train of Terror begins with three children happily returning from a day trip to visit relatives. Soon their laughter turns to cries of terror as they meet the boogeyman (in this case, a demonic mountain goblin perhaps?) as their train enters a dark tunnel. Exiting the tunnel on the other side, only they remain unchanged. Their fellow passengers now have dark, mask-like expressions and pupil-less eyes!

In the tradition of Invaders from Mars and Invasion of the Body Snatchers, the hapless children are alienated and hunted, with no one believing their strange accusations. One boy even suspects his parents of being different and wonders what the thing in the large sack they are burying late one night is. He is soon on the run, evading hordes of dark, pupil-less classmates, and adults that want to cause him serious bodily harm. In a unique twist, we are left with a happy ending, but not for long?

Now picture if you will, Morticia Addams sitting by a nice cozy fire, cups of hot and frothy, mashed eye-of-yak spiked cocoa steaming away, and Wednesday and Pugsley curled up around her like some lamenting felines as she reads the fairytale, Zoroku's Strange Disease. Never has a children's story conveyed such purulent corruption in its narrative and textured artwork. How wonderful!

Zoroku, the titular hero of the story, yearns to draw colorful pictures, but the evil villagers make fun of him and his condition. It seems that a little rash has turned to a boil, and a boil to many, and many to something much, much worse.

Poor Zoroku becomes covered with a "colorful purulence," and the villagers and their children drive him away to solitude, deep into the forest by a strange lake. Unfortunately for him, the purulence gives off an odor that would curl paint, and his boils ooze so badly, maggots infest them in the hundreds. My, what a quaint Brothers Grimm fairytale kind of picture, don't you think? But there is a happy ending. Well, happy for a horror story kind of fairytale, that is. 

Hideshi Hino blends his real and imagined selves into his fancifully grotesque stories too easily, revealing his fears and doubts with society and culture, making it a crapshoot as to where the real Hideshi Hino truly lives.