Horror
Specific retailers (you can check out the list of participating comic shops here) will be opening their doors at midnight tonight to celebrate the release of Marvel's The Dark Tower: The Long Way Home #1. Personally, I would go in my chaps and all as Roland, but I'd like to save people from the horrors. Is anyone else going to be participating?
Joseph Michael Linsner is one of those artists whose books I read solely because of how pretty they look. I've never been particularly wowed by any of the Dawn comics' writing, but I keep on buying the damn things because Linsner's paintings make for such lovely images.
Over at Comic Book Resources, Eva Hopkins sat down and explained how she and Joseph worked out the cover art for their upcoming Dark Ivory, due to be published by Image Comics. It's a quick little read, but one I'd recommend for anyone who does comic-style artwork.
ANATOMY OF A JOSEPH MICHAEL LINSNER COVER [CBR]
Joe Hill, the author of the very good (and very scary) Heart-Shaped Box and 20th Century Ghosts is teaming up with IDW comics to put forth a new horror/fantasy comic book titled Locke & Key.
The comic will tell the story about a group of children who find themselves in a New England mansion which possesses a number of fantastical powers and gateways which can change the fundamental essence of a person. Of course, there's also an evil monster lurking in the shadows trying to mess things up for our intrepid heroes as the story goes along.
I've read Heart-Shaped Box, and found Hill's very visual literary style to be refreshing and great at delivering the scares all at once. That, combined with the art of Gabriel Rodriguez (who did all the art for The Great and Secret Show), should make for an interesting comic experience.
Read the press release after the jump.
You gotta love it when stuff like this happens: in order to celebrate the 50th issue of the sheer amazingness that is The Walking Dead, Erik Larsen drew this image as a limited-edition variant cover. Originally, the plan was for one out of every 100 comics to sport this picture, but Image just announced they're going to make it a one-in-25 deal.
Hit the jump for the press release.
Seriously effed up. That's really all there is to say about Johnny the Homicidal Maniac. A creation of Jhonen Vasquez of Invader Zim fame, JTHM centers on the titular Johnny C. who is a serial killer and mass murder, but all around good guy. Through Johnny, Vasquez explores various elements of our urban-blighted, post-consumerist hell (I think he has just lived in LA too long) that we call the US. Major themes are evil, urban life, Heaven and Hell, tenuousness of personal relationships.
Strange Cases, one of those quirky comics which I missed when it first came out, is a total gem. The art style is both polished and cartoony, and the book's overall feel is one of tongue-in-cheek humor. Oh, and the protagonist totally looks like Ash Williams without the chainsaw-for-a-hand thing.
Comic Vine has a preview of Issue #3 online, so if you're interested in checking the book out before you buy it, I'd recommend taking a gander and falling in love. Hit the jump for the issue's press release.
Steve Niles' Strange Cases #3 Preview [Comic Vine]
For those of us who've been reading The Walking Dead for a while now, things have certainly gotten shaken up in the past couple of issues, thanks to the return of the always sinister Governor. Well, admittedly, the tank he drove up in probably helped shake things up a little, too.
However, the point is that Robert Kirkman sat down with the good folks over at Newsarama and discussed why he's taking the plot for his amazing series in the direction he has:
NRAMA: Just when everything is looking sweet for our main characters in their safe prison walls, and they have the garden growing and the baby born and the wedding all wrapped up nice and tidy, you had to bring the Governor back, riding on a tank and ready for war.
RK: Got to keep things interesting, you know? If it was a comic about people growing crops and reading books and having a merry old time, I doubt people would continue reading.
So, what's going to happen over the next couple of issues, huh? Will Rick finally become zombie chow? Why the hell was the governor making out with his zombified daughter? How bad does your mouth have to taste after doing something like that, anyway? Head on over to Newsarama to find out!
ROBERT KIRKMAN: HEADED TOWARD THE WALKING DEAD APOCALYPSE [Newsarama]
Clive Barker's The Great and Secret Show, originally published as a miniseries and then as two trade paperbacks, is now being released in one single collection by IDW publishing. The comic was adapted from Barker's novel, itself originally released in 1989 and serving as the first entry in his "Art" trilogy (the second entry into the trilogy, Everville was released in 1994 and the third novel has yet to be published).
I actually picked up the TPBs about a month ago when I was looking for some comics to help me pass the time on a two day drive; I really enjoyed them because they not only did a nice job of capturing Barker's eerie and sensual narrative style, but Gabriel Rodriguez's art is beautiful to look at (especially when things get Really Weird during the series' last act). If you have the opportunity, I'd recommend checking it out.
Read the full press release after the jump.
Horror movies, much like anything else associated with that genre at large, are a bit of an acquired taste. People tend to either like them or hate them, with very few standing in the middle ground. I myself have always enjoyed the genre, so long as what I'm viewing, reading, or listening to is... well, for lack of a better term, good. In order to keep me entertained, the book needs to be well-written, the movie needs to be stylishly made, and it doesn't hurt a comic to have some slick artwork to go along with a strong story and dialogue.
When 30 Days of Night was originally published as a graphic novel, it took me a while to warm up to it because Ben Templesmith's art style wasn't something I particularly appreciated until I'd had a little more exposure to it through his work on the Silent Hill comics. When I actually picked up his take on vampires in Alaska and took it home with me, I found myself falling in love with it fairly quickly.
Naturally, I was a little suspicious when a film version of the comic was announced, though my worries were lessened when I found out that David Slade was going to be directing it. While, yes, he was making a comic-based movie, his last film was the controversial Hard Candy -which proved he is a director able to make an incredibly mature movie without caring whether or not he pleases mainstream audiences- and I wondered how his directorial style would actually mesh with the artistic one of Templesmith's visuals.
The movie's story doesn't really deviate from that of the comic (vampires terrorize a small town in Alaska which is so far north that night lasts for a solid month), but the main challenge Slade faces is making the overall visual style something which the franchise's obsessive fans won't scream bloody murder over. Slade does this nicely, to be honest, largely through his command of color (oftentimes, it's his use of a lack of color, though, which makes the film look so damn good). Of course, the fact that he packed a stellar cast into the -admittedly, sometimes shallow- roles do a great job with their characters, too. My particular favorite was Danny Huston in the vampiric role of Marlow, though Ben Foster and the always entertaining Josh Hartnett are close behind with their performances, as well.
Overall, 30 Days of Night is an incredibly slick horror movie, one that manages to take the subject of vampires and do what 28 Days Later did for zombies. If you're a fan of the comic, or horror films in general, you'll most likely adore it. If, however, the supernatural/horrific genre isn't your cup of tea, then you'll probably want to give this one a pass.
OK, so I would totally buy XXXombies simply for the name. And I would totally buy it for the cover. Oh, wait, it's being written by Rick Remender and drawn by Tony Moore? Dammit, why don't I just give you bastards my bank PIN code and make taking my money all the easier?
Over at Newsarama, there's a preview up about the forthcoming XXXombies by Kieron Dwyer, who manages to tantalize fans with some "DVD commentary" on scans of pages that are posted on the site. While I highly recommend reading the entire feature, I was particularly entertained by the inspiration for the comic's concept:
As a child of the ‘70s with fond recollections of the porn films from that era (snuck in to see Debbie Does Dallas when I was 13) and a healthy affection for zombie movies and horror flicks from all times, this is a great place for me to be right now. Rick and I have a total blast talking about the stuff we’ll do with these characters, as well as in the upcoming story arcs in Crawl Space.
AGAINST THE GRAIN: INSIDE CRAWL SPACE: XXXOMBIES #1 [Newsarama]
Well, now, it just wouldn't be October if we didn't have a comic featuring a demonic invasion of the Earth, would it? Well, you're in luck! This week's Rough Trade Friday focuses on the sumptuous Strange Girl, brought to us by Rick Remender and Eric Nguyen.
Remender's writing tells the story of a world in which the Rapture occurs, after which God withdraws his protection from the world and leaves it ripe for a demonic invasion to occur. The invasion happens minutes after all the righteous humans are brought into Heaven, and Hell proceeds to reign over Earth for over a decade. As the comic begins, Bethany Black is working in a bar for a demon lord, kept out of the hard labor and slave trades reserved for most of humanity because she has the ability to cast magic (something which is practically unheard of amongst mankind). One day, she and her companion demon Bloato manage to piss off their patron and they decide to make a run for it in order to find a rumored gateway to Heaven. The journey takes them around the country, into the very maw of Hell, and -hopefully- to an eventual destination which involves a lot of white light and harps. Along the way, they encounter homicidal demons, homicidal hillbillies, homicidal soldiers, and a couple of other entertaining characters to keep them busy.
Remender's dialogue and plotlines manage to keep the comic moving along at a brisk pace, with sarcasm and wry humor managing to prevent the overall plot from feeling too dreary at any time. However, there are some genuinely horrifying moments throughout the series and readers are occasionally reminded that this world is a Very Bad Place indeed. Nguyen's artwork manages to serve as a near-perfect match for the comic, largely because his lines and colors are so dynamic and unique.
However, this is one of those series which needs to be started from the beginning, otherwise you'll have absolutely no clue as to what's going on if you pick up an issue halfway through the storyline. Fortunately, the first three segments are in convenient trade paperback formats, so it's an easy task to catch up on what's been going on throughout the series.
Zombies are sort of the red-headed stepchildren of the horror industry, probably because their character development caps out pretty quickly and because they aren't so much evil as they are simply brainless and hungry. There's only so much that most writers can do with that, apparently. I've often enjoyed zombie stories, if for no other reason than for the way in which they show us how ordinary people end up reacting to the extraordinary situation of their neighbors rising up from the grave and trying to eat their faces off. If that doesn't push someone past the breaking point, I don't know what will.
Image Comics' The Walking Dead is an example of a great zombie story, probably because it has yet to reach a definite endpoint. As a result, the main characters are forced to be more than a bunch of gun-wielding badasses making their way to a safe zone because, well, there are no safe zones for them to escape to. This fact forces the characters to stay cautious and smart because they know that they are never really safe from the force that destroyed their old lives and killed so many of their loved ones.
The protagonist of the series is Rick Grimes, a small town sheriff who awakens from a coma (a la 28 Days Later) to find his world has been washed away by the tide of the Zombie Apocalypse. Originally seeking out (and eventually finding) his wife and son, Rick ends up recruiting a large rotating cast of characters in a quest to survive in this strange new world. Many of the characters meet spectacularly gruesome ends along the way, only to be replaced by others; some of the replacements themselves pass on in equally unsubtle ways, and some are still around at the time I write this... but every character in the series is monumentally changed by the things they see and are forced to endure.
Robert Kirkman's sharp writing, combined with the black-and-white art of Tony Moore and Charlie Adlard makes this bleak series an addictive read. If you can find it, I would recommend picking up the hardcover edition because it contains so many issues in one go. However, even if you can't snag the oh-so-shiny hardcover version, the individual collections are much more readily available at most bookstores. So go, my little ghouls and goblins, and kick off this October zombie style!
"Oh Lois, you SO don't want to know!"
Comic of the Week
Frater Mine by Sean McGrath and Juan Romera
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