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.
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