by
Ghastly McNasty
Who better to devote a horror comic to than the grand daddy of the macabre, H.P. Lovercraft himself. The first edition of this interesting looking graphic novel was released in April of this year and has already caused quite a stir. It seems Universal Pictures has snapped up the movie rights to produce The Strange Adventures of H.P.Lovecraft, Mac Carter and Jeff Blitz’s disturbing take on the life of Mr Lovercraft.
Toiling away as a timid and eccentric writer of pulp horror stories, H.P. Lovecraft, is powerless in the world… in love with a girl who doesn’t love him back, mired in a profession that inspires no respect and frozen in the grip of a terrible writer’s block. Until one day when everything changes. Lovecraft comes in contact with an ancient book that passes onto him an insidious curse: whenever he sleeps, his darkest nightmares come true and are loosed on the world. Suddenly, this shy and bumbling writer becomes both an unwitting god of destruction and the only man who can fight the wickedness he unleashes. It’s a fantastical revision of the life and work of H.P. Lovecraft, a story in the mold of the classic Universal horror movies. A weird tale indeed.
Looks pretty darn good and anything Lovecraft related has got to be worth a punt. Visit The Strange Adventures of H.P.Lovecraft website for more information.
by
Ghastly McNasty
Being a medical horror comic by Mssrs. Brandon Seifert and Lukas Ketner
If your looking for an example of excellent artwork and a ripping good yarn then it’s surely worth your time delving in to the world of Witch Doctor.
About Witch Doctor
Vincent Morrow’s fall from grace in the medical world was swift, total, and his own damn fault.
He would’ve ended things that same night if he hadn’t been headhunted into an exciting new career — in the black arts. Then there was the matter of pulling a certain sword out of a certain stone and being declared earth’s destined protector, but he’d rather you didn’t mention that. The obedient path of mystical tradition isn’t the one for Morrow. The Holy Grail made a great sink — it just needed a hole for the plumbing and a rubber stopper in the bottom — and earth’s vampires, zombies and other superfauna are just patients to him, victims of unknown illnesses waiting to be treated.
It’s a sick world. And Dr. Morrow serves it with both hands — one in magic, one in medicine — as earth’s Sorcerer General. Earth’s Witch Doctor.
Witch Doctor has some really great characters that strengthen the storyline. The lead character has an intriguing personality and if you venture on to the Witch Doctor site and read the preview story ‘First Incision’ you will definately leave wanting to know more about the mysterious and intelligent Vincent Morrow.
It seems from their blog they have just lined up a fresh story so scoot on over and get a taste of this great indy comic. You can find out more about this awesome comic and read the first story at the Witch Doctor website
by
Ghastly McNasty
Night Zero is a photo comic book that pretty much stands out in it’s field. Very professionally made it harkes back to a time when Doomlord used same technique in some of the older issues of Eagle. Check out the blurb below and visit the site to read for yourself
NIGHT ZERO is a photo comic book, or fumetti, produced on location in Seattle, Washington. It is a collaboratively-driven project that blends the talents of writers, actors, photographers, digital artists, and film crews, to create a graphic novel unlike any other.
THE STORY
Set in the months following a deadly viral outbreak, NIGHT ZERO follows the lives of the surviving population of Seattle, Washington. Holding together in the New City, a semblance of normalcy barricaded against the terrors of the world outside, those still alive have no choice but to throw their lots in with the rest and make a new future.
THE LOOK
NIGHT ZERO is produced like a feature film, shot on-location with a full cast and crew, complete with sets, props, and costumes. Using the emerging technology of High Dynamic Range photography (HDR) and a process called tonemapping, our digital artists are able to transform the images into a unique visual style somewhere between photography and illustration. There is no tracing or hand drawing superimposed on the photographs– the “illustrated” style is purely the result of the HDR photography method.
You can find more information about this amazing project and read the comic stories in full by visiting the Night Zero website.
If you’re interested in the spectacular zombie horror game Left 4 Dead then you may want to check out Left 5 Dead also from the creators of Night Zero. The artistic after-touches applied to these photographs create an amazing effect. Top notch work!
by
M.I.K.
The cover of The Mammoth Book Of Best Horror Comics, claims that it contains “OVER 50 OF THE GREATEST HORROR COMICS AND GRAPHIC SHORT STORIES EVER PRODUCED”.
It doesn’t.
Something being the “best” or “greatest”, is of course, a matter of opinion, (and there is some good stuff in here), but that doesn’t alter the fact that whether you agree with that part of the claim on the cover or not, there are only 48 stories in the book. This is probably a genuine mistake on the part of the publisher, but it’s an odd one to make, especially since all the stories are quite clearly listed in the contents section. Stranger still, if you google the title of this book, you’ll find it on sale alongside a picture of what is obviously an earlier version of the cover which claims it contains “60″ stories.
This isn’t the only mistake in the book. Two of the stories have their pages printed in the wrong order, which rather messes up the structure of the tales.
However, these are just minor niggles, as overall this is a very well put together and varied collection. The Book is divided into four sections, each devoted to a different era of horror comics and each preceded by a small chapter on the decade in question, all written by the editor, Peter Normanton. Normanton also provides a foreword and notes on each story. He’s no stranger to horror publications himself, having edited the horror fanzine From The Tomb for the last eight years.
The stories are reprinted in black and white and while a few pages of colour wouldn’t have gone amiss, the reproduction is good enough. There’s plenty here to satisfy anyone’s craving for horror.
Overall rating 7.5/10
If you like this volume, as I’m sure you will, The Mammoth Book Of Zombie Comics is out in October and The Mammoth Book Of Best Crime Comics is out in a few days time.
The Mammoth Book Of Best Horror Comics
ISBN : 978-1-84529-641-4
Publisher : Constable & Robinson Ltd
544 pages Price : £12.99
by
Countess Duckula
Junji Ito is currently Japan’s top horror “manga-ka”, and, with his “Museum of Terror” series, I had a lot of fun finding out why.
Currently there are three volumes of “Museum of Terror”, a reprint in English of his short stories, which also follow the right-to-left reading format. His “Tomie” stories are well-known, and are collected in “Museum of Terror” vols. 1 and 2 as well as being made into movies.
Ito’s style is realistic and atmospheric, but strongly Japanese. His stories tend to disturb with grotesque twists, instead of just relying on violence and gross-outs…although there’s certainly no absence of gore, either.
His characters seem to be trapped in a capricious world where there isn’t any objective good or evil, only evil consequences. At first glance, I felt bored by the absence of flashy art and the rather simple page layouts, but one plot twist later, and I’d pretty much lost my taste for big-eyed manga pap.
(As a quick digression, I have fond memories of my first contact with his work, which was MoT vol 3. I really didn’t know what to expect, except that buying a volume of short horror stories instead of one long story seemed like a good idea with a new manga author. )
So, I was waiting for the train home, listening to some pleasant lounge type music, and reading “Bio House”, a story about a powerful old businessman who tries to tempt his pretty young secretary to join him in indulging her more…interesting appetites. So there she is, sitting at the lavish, gruesome dinner table, and casually holding up a refreshing glass of “snake’s blood?”… that was when I knew I’d found something…special. After devouring, sorry, enthusiastically reading, the rest of the book, I moved on to read Ito’s “Tomie” stories.
Tomie is an eternally young, perfectly beautiful Japanese schoolgirl who drives women mad with envy and men crazy with desire. In fact, they become so obsessed they usually feel the need to dismember her for some reason…but she just won’t stay gone. Men, women, children, Tomie destroys the lives of everyone who is unfortunate enough to come across her…
Interestingly enough, the characters meet their doom through their own actions rather than hers. But these tales are not morality plays, because in Tomie’s world, it seems that no-one is too innocent or too sane to escape untouched. There is a certain sense of fatalism about these stories.
The variety of the stories comes from the widely different characters who meet Tomie, and the different ways she works on their individual psyches to the inevitable, destructive conclusion. But the violence against Tomie isn’t some sad, mysogynist fantasy, because somehow Tomie always seems to win in the end. She regenerates, and propagates, with the inevitability of a virus, and in one story involving jealous brothers, her attempted destruction results in multiple Tomies, once again stalking their way into an unsuspecting world.
It’s a fascinating, disturbing look at sexual desire, obsession, and beauty, taken to a very…Japanese…extreme, and I do mean that as a compliment. Japanese horror tends to be more disturbing than our fare over here in the Tame West.
This is some of the best horror manga around…recommended to anyone who likes a true femme fatale…
Recommended 10/10
(The images in this article are from the Tomie stories and are © Junji Ito and Dark Horse Comics.)
by
Ghastly McNasty
Uzumaki is a manga horror comic written and drawn by Junji Ito. It has recently been made in to a live action movie but this review focuses on the manga stories currently available as a 3 volume graphic novel series.
Uzumaki (translated means spiral) tells the story of the town of Kurozu-cho a small Japanese fishing village that has been cursed by spirals. Residents find themselves increasing obsessed with the shape and form of the spiral which leads to countless horrific deaths and bizarre events throughout the town. These events are viewed through the eyes of Kirie Goshima a young high school student who bears witness to the increasing madness as friends and family are taken over by the curse.
The first 2 volumes are filled with individual stories of terror while the third volume brings the whole tale to conclusion. The stand-alone stories are the most chilling of this entire macabre series but Junji Ito does well to actually finish such an unusual and original story without ever fully explaining exactly what has taken place.
Opinion
What makes this story so interesting is that Junji Ito has taken a completely random everyday shape, the spiral, and turned it into something unknown and fearful. The ‘creature’ in this horror story is impossible to define and the horror comes from the actions of the characters who fall for the spirals charms. It gives you a certain sense of paranoia and uneasiness because these seemingly innocent shapes are all around us.
What really sets this manga apart from other horror manga is Ito’s excellent artwork. It follows the basic manga style but he manages to draw some really disturbing images throughout the series. He is able to produce big scares with the revolting imagery alone. When you add to the mix the extremely spooky storyline the result is a modern horror masterpiece.
Rating
This is the first comic book review on this site and maybe I chose Uzumaki because it’s the easiest to review. It’s certainly not the easiest to explain but as a reviewer I can only come to one, easy to make, conclusion. This is manga at its very best!
Heartily recommended to anyone who is a fan of horror, fantasy, surrealism and comics. A very worthy 10/10
Ghastly 
M.I.K.
Countess 
Jova