MEDIA DIARY, NOV 4, 2019 ~ COMIC REVIEWS

THE PLOT #1 (of 8)
Vault Comics
Tim Daniel, Michael Moresi, writers, Josh Hixson, art

“In order to receive… first you must give.” That’s the motto of Blaine family patriarch, expressed in the flashback scene that starts out this, the first issue of a paradoxically fresh-yet-old-school horror comic called The Plot. By the time you’ve finished reading this intriguing debut, you’ll have a sneaking suspicion that the comic’s creators will be wringing out a whole lot of sinister meaning from these eight simple words.

The Plot is the first series in Vault Comics’ planned Nightfall imprint, which will publish one new self-contained horror-related limited series every year, sort of like a comic book version of AMC’s hugely successful American Horror Story franchise. It’s a nifty concept that I’d like to see more imprints and creators try out.

The first issue sets up a pretty classic horrific Americana narrative, complete with a multi-generational curse, a big old remote family pile surrounded by swampy woodlands on Maine’s chilly, windswept coastline, and, of course, a monster… and I doubt I’m spoiling things by telling you this, as said creature features prominently on the cover.

After the intro, we jump ahead a couple decades, with prodigal son Chase having to step up and take charge after his brother and sister-in-law are brutally murdered by the aforementioned monster, leaving their children, McKenzie and Zach, in Chase's charge. By the end of the issue, we’re left to wonder whether Chase is the best man for the job, whether there’s something weird going on with the kids, and whether we can trust what we’re being shown via Hixson’s funky, chunky panels (which sort of remind this reviewer of an elevated, moodier, “adult” version of Steve Ditko’s work for horror titles by the likes of Gold Key and Charlton).

If you feel you simply must know more before deciding on whether or not to pick up this title, here’s a great, in-depth look at The Plot from our friends at Comic Book Yeti. It really tells you pretty much everything anyone could ever want to know about the book and its creators.

SILVER SURFER: BLACK #3, #4 (of 5)
Marvel Comics
Story: Donny Cates, Art: Tradd Moore

This series continues to amaze and delight in equal measure. If you are any sort of comic book and/or superhero fan at all, you owe it to yourself to be picking up Silver Surfer: Black. Although now that the series is completed (the fifth issue came out last Wednesday, and it’s waiting for me in my pull box at The Beguiling), you’re probably going to want to wait for the trade paperback collecting all five issues in a single volume.

Because I have yet to read this limited series’ final issue, I don’t have much to say about issues 3 and 4 for now, except to declare that a more perfect wedding of narrative and illustrative talents, I haven’t experienced in living memory; particularly not in a title from a mainstream publisher!

If you can still pick up all five issues at your local comics shop for cover price (or close to it), I would do so. I have a sneaking suspicion Marvel might not have known the potency of this work of alchemical comics genius when they first decided to put it out, and may have underprinted the first couple issues. I generally don’t worry about the speculators’ game, except when it’s instantaneous, like with that whole "Batman’s penis" scandal from last year that made my copies of Batman Damned #1 go up in value by 2000% pretty much overnight!

GHOST RIDER #1
Marvel Comics
Story: Ed Brisson, Art: Aaron Kuder

Speaking of a beautiful matching of story and art, cult favorite character Ghost Rider has rarely been served better than he is currently being served by the creative team of Brisson and Kuder.

In the inaugural issue of this newly minted title, we are treated to not one, but TWO flaming skull-headed badasses! With the original Johnny Blaze currently the acting King of Hell (which makes him more of a warden, considering how ornery his constituency can be), up topside, Johnny’s brother Danny Ketch has had to fill in by donning the mantle of Earth’s Spirit of Vengeance, even though all he wants to do is run his new bar, The Fadeaway, and drink himself into oblivion.

So that’s the setup for this, a sort of soft reboot of Ghost Rider's continuity, which has gotten pretty convoluted over the past few years. In this issue, we see that Johnny is having a bit of a rough time ruling Hell after successfully usurping the throne from Mephisto in the recently completed “Damnation” cross-title event.

On top of all the other big-time Lords of Darkness looking to steal Hell out from under Johnny’s wheels (as well as all the incredible powers that come with ruling Hell), lower-level demons are constantly trying to escape into the surface world. This issue sees Johnny asking for Danny’s assistance in chasing down the escapees.

It all makes for a lot of really gorgeously-rendered comic book fun, and I personally enjoyed every goofy, monster-stuffed page of it. And it seems like the creators are having a lot of fun with it, too. I’ll definitely be picking up this title for the next little while!

BLACK RIVER
Fantagraphics

by Josh Simmons

With my recent review of his collection of graphic short pieces The Furry Trap, I made no secret of my admiration for the work of Josh Simmons. 2015's Black River does nothing to dampen my enthusiasm.

Telling the bleak, often disturbing post-Apocalyptic story of a group of wandering women (and one man) in search of a city where rumor has it everyone helps each other out and the electricity still flows, Black River makes a perfect companion piece to Cormac McCarthy's novel, The Road. In fact, if there was a way to somehow get a copy out to McCarthy, I'd love to find out what he makes of this unique and unsparingly nihilistic chronicle. 

I don't want to say too much about this book, because it's my fervent hope that many of you will seek it out, buy it, and read it. And I don't want to spoil it for those hypothetical people. 

One last thing, about the book's title, seeing as there doesn't seem to be any particularly important "black river" in the story. I believe that it was Simmons' intention to use the title to describe life in the post-Apocalyptic world that he depicts as a river of black... a never-ending, unrelenting, unbroken continuity of ever-flowing darkness. 

VIVISECTIONARY
Fantagraphics

By Kate Lacour

According to the Fantagraphics page on this book: 

From "vivisection," the act of dissecting living specimens, and "bestiary," a compendium of real and mythical creatures. A series of visual sequential experiments in the physiological, the pathological, and the occult. A bizarre and mesmerizing investigation through the marvels of biology and myth to uncover the extraordinary in the ordinary, the magic in science, the sublime in the grotesque.

I picked up this book because I love this kind of thing... an intriguing, surreal, and beautiful presentation that touches on the occult and the horrific, all wrapped up in a gorgeous and unique package. The front cover, for instance, is mostly a hole!

Much like the book that it most closely resembles, that being the legendary Codex Seraphinianus (full PDF available here), there's no story here, therefore I have nothing much to say about it, except to declare that Kate Lacour is an artist with an admirably twisted mind. It's rare that I find art that offers me even the mildest of shocks these days, and Lacour succeeds in disturbing on more than a few occasions. Consider that either a recommendation or a warning, it's entirely up to you.

If you'd like to buy a copy of this book, you can do so through my Amazon affiliate link, or not. Again, it's entirely up to you. For now, I will leave you with some intriguing images from Lacour's bizarre (and quite affordable) tome...

HOUSE OF X / POWERS OF X (THE FULL SAGA) REVIEW

HOUSE OF X / POWERS OF X (the full saga)
Marvel Comics
Story: Johnathan Hickman, Art: Pepe Larraz, R.B. Silva

Well now, this is an interesting case. After years of neglecting (some would say flat-out sabotaging) the X-franchise out of spite over not having access to these one-time flagship superstars for their movies, Marvel’s comics division has finally decided to rehab, retcon and revamp everything mutant-related, coinciding with the moment Disney got the rights back to use all those characters in the MCU. What a stroke of luck!

To tackle the monumental feat of untangling the ridiculous mess they’ve made of things, Marvel cancelled every ongoing X-book and tasked their chosen writer—Johnathan Hickman—with creating a new foundation upon which all future X-titles would build. They also gave him carte blanche to do with these characters as he saw fit. Whatever he came up with would constitute the new Year Zero for Marvel’s mutants. So, here’s what Hickman came up with…

Two limited series, each six issues long, each featuring some of the best artwork yet produced by both Silva and Larraz, coming out over a twelve-week span between July and September of 2019. But they’re not just two separate series! Oh no. They’re two series meant to be read together in a special, specific, irregular rotation! 

You know what? Explaining the structure will take longer than just reading an issue, so if you want to catch just a glimpse of the lengths to which Hickman has gone in order to complicate that which needn't have been so complicated, check out this Wikipedia page on both titles—House of X and Powers of X—the latter of which should actually be read as “Powers of TEN”, which is yet another unnecessary over-complication that isn’t half as clever as Hickman seems to think it is… particularly when he’s making huge mistakes that throw the whole narrative out of whack.

Anyway, House of X covers the first few weeks of the new mutant “present”, which involves the establishment of a homeland for mutants on the island of Krakoa (which is, itself, a fully conscious mutant, and a member of the ruling council). Krakoa is capable of producing flowers that have incredible powers, and Professor X has come up with a plan to barter pharmaceuticals created with these botanicals (they extend life by a ridiculously precise five years, and cure almost all “diseases of the mind”) to get homo sapien sapiens to at long last leave homo superior alone. Of course, for mutants, these flowers have the power to create, like, buildings, or even entirely new landmasses in the middle of the ocean, as well as instantaneous teleportation jump-points (even to the moon!), among other things.

And then there’s a whole sub-plot about formerly minor-league mutants suddenly being elevated to elite, even Omega status, due to Hickman finding ways to make them super-useful somehow. Key among these being the ridiculous character Goldballs, whose power, up until recently, was the ability to emit golden colored basketball sized balls from his chest with a certain amount of concussive force, and who now, as part of a five-mutant squad—given the super-creative team name “The Five”—holds the key to literal mutant immortality, which itself is the end result of such precariously patchy, under-baked wish-fulfillment fantasizing that it makes some of Hickman’s worst decisions in his awful Secret Wars series seem philosophically sophisticated by comparison. It all pushes the whole suspension of disbelief thing to the absolute breaking point, and beyond.

But that’s the New Way now, dig? And hey, at least it allows Hickman to send a team of beloved, classic X-men characters (Cyclops, Jean Grey, Wolverine, Nightcrawler and a handful others) on a suicide mission into outer space, where those nasty old humans (with participants from SHIELD, SWORD—aka Space SHIELD—AIM and even HYDRA!) are hatching up yet another genocidal plot to annihilate all of mutant-kind in the form of a Sentinel that is even bigger than the Master Mold that murdered millions of mutants on Genosha not so long ago… a MOTHER Mold that shits out Master Molds for breakfast, or something. 

Anyway, this team of mutants, none of whom behave at all like the characters we’ve come to know and love, all get to sacrifice themselves heroically, only to be “brought back” in the goofiest way possible. And then the Krakoan council exacts “mutant justice” on Sabertooth. And then all the mutants party like it’s 1999. Seriously. It's even hinted at that Scott, Jean and Wolverine are now in an open, polyamorous relationship.

And, wow, does it NOT feel like everything is in its right place.

The other title, Powers of X, lets Hickman wave his freak flag even higher, because it is alternately set in the present, ten years from now, a hundred years from now, and a thousand years from now (Powers of ten! Get it?).

In many ways, Powers of X is the more successful title (at least, when it’s not dealing with any mutants that we may formerly have cared about). That’s because it features some genuinely interesting speculative concepts about the potential future of AI, the possibility of encountering alien intelligences embodied in such constructs, the consequences of being biological when confronting a hyper-advanced consciousness that is kind of disgusted by that, etc.

It’s enough to make me think that, if given the chance to create his own characters and build his own universe, Hickman might be able to produce work of lasting value and genuine worth. Unfortunately, giving him the X-men to play with—particularly considering that all this stuff is now considered canon—has resulted in an unmitigated mess that is, if anything, worse than what he started out with. 

My main reason for saying this is because these X-men books are not about the X-men. If you’re not now, and have never been, an X-men fan, then you needn’t worry about why that is. If, however, you are (or were) one, then you should go into these series understanding that the main characters aren't Cyclops, Wolverine, Storm, Beast, Nightcrawler, etc. Hell, Mister Sinister and some dude named Exodus get more face-time than the vast majority of past X-team superstars in this book. Instead, the main characters are Xavier, Magneto, and former secondary character made pivotal linchpin mutant powerhouse Moira MacTaggart.

MacTaggart’s evolution here is probably the best idea that Hickman came up with for these books, and it’s too good a surprise (and too over-complicating a story element) for me to describe in detail, here. Besides which, a pretty good summary is included in the above-linked Wiki page. Or, heck, why not just watch this Youtube summary of the whole debacle, as put together by someone who liked it a lot more than I did? It’ll give you a different perspective, at least. Besides, I’m tired of thinking about all this.

Oh! Two more things before I let you go. First, the artwork in both books is some of the most polished work I’ve seen in Marvel superhero books in recent years. The renditions of the Mother Mold and future Nimrod super-Sentinels in particular really captured my imagination. The other thing is Hickman’s trademark use of weird information-rich visual guides like pie charts, blueprint schematics, timelines, and other such things… I know people have complained about their overuse in these titles, but I felt they at least helped to let us know WTF was going on from book to book, so I appreciated them.

Now, enjoy the video!

MEDIA DIARY, FEATURING 'THE BOYS' AND A BUNCH OF COMICS

Welcome to my latest Media Diary.  Today, we'll begin with TV, and a series I just binge-watched from beginning to end. Here it is!

THE BOYS
Amazon Prime

Based on the cult Garth Ennis/Darick Robertson comic book series, The Boys is about an on again, off again clandestine team of deep cover agents whose job is, ostensibly, to keep a tight leash on the nation’s growing community of superheroes. These “supes”, as the Boys refer to them, are mostly affiliated with Vought-American, a vastly powerful private corporation that has its tentacles wrapped around everything from pharmaceuticals and defense contracts to movie production and a 24-hour news channel.

All of Vought’s disparate entities operate behind a ruthlessly enforced, corporation-wide, culturally “conservative” facade, infused with the sort of pseudo-populist, phony Christian “friendly fascism” with real-world echoes that should be all too familiar to anyone whose powers of perception are superior to those of the average jar of mayonnaise.

The Boys consist of Billy Butcher (Karl Urban), the hot-headed, foul-mouthed leader, Frenchie, the weapons expert, Mother’s Milk, whom the others look up to as being the most pure-hearted, the Female (of the Species), who is a deadly dangerous, psychologically damaged young South Asian mute who was drugged by Vought as part of a treacherous plan to [NO SPOILERS FROM ME], and Wee Hughie, who longs for revenge against A-Train, a speedster supe (and member of the World’s Greatest Superhero Team, The Seven) who, while freaking out on a dose of the specialist supe pharmaceutical Compound V (as opposed to Compound W, America’s most popular wart removal system), ran straight through his girlfriend, accidentally exploding her like a water balloon full of blood and guts.

Meanwhile, The Seven are also important characters who get a lot of screen time in their own right, particularly team leader The Homelander, sort of a psycho-fascist cross between Superman and Captain America. There’s also the newest member of The Seven, the relatively innocent and swiftly disenchanted Starlight, who coincidentally—some might say a little too coincidentally—becomes Wee Hughie’s friend and love interest after a chance encounter in a park.

I have long been a fan of the comic book The Boys. It’s an intriguing concept—one that was tried a few years before, with far less recognition and far fewer laughs, with the 11-issue run of the DC series Stormwatch: Team Achilles (a series of which I appear to be the sole surviving fan)—and the Amazon studios version of The Boys feels like an unmitigated success to me, even if it isn’t slavishly faithful to the comics.

However, where the series truly excels, even exceeds expectations, is in how it takes the comic book’s portrayal of the prevailing political climate of illegitimate Preznit Dubya’s post-9/11, post-T.H.E.U.S.A.P.A.T.R.I.O.T.A.C.T., post-Shock-and-Awe America—the often justified paranoia and distrust engendered by all those no-bid multi-billion-dollar contracts and unaccountable mercenaries murdering carloads of innocent Iraqis and the phony rescue narrative cooked up around “kidnapped” soldier Jessica Lynch and the very suspicious “friendly fire” death of former NFL’er Pat Tillman, all of which led to the rapid rise of conspiracy theorizing as America’s new favorite pastime—and updating it for the even more horrific, post-reality, anti-truth, proof-allergic, New Fascist International(e) America, full of brainwashed, Bizzaro World, “alt”-media sheeple who think that repeating their favorite paranoid, raging, Pizzagating Q-tard Youtuber’s rants verbatim proves that they’re independent, original thinkers who “do their own research”, all of which are hallmarks of the even more illegitimate Reality TV criminal/traitor Preznit Donald Trump’s ongoing pornocratic kakistocracy.

Anyhoo, I binge-watched all eight episodes of The Boys in one day, and the entire series just flew by. Oh, and just for the record, I’m totally ready for Season Two, and hope they’ve already begun to film it, because Season One ends on one hell of a cliffhanger. RECOMMENDED!

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And now, it's time for COMICS!

INHUMANS #1, 2, 4

Marvel Comics
Writers: Pacheco/Marin, Artist Jose Ladronn

Roughly three years ago, I asked the lovely folks at The Beguiling (my favorite comic book and art book specialty shoppe) to keep an eye out for a relatively rare, not-so-popular 4-issue miniseries, published in 2000, featuring Marvel Comics' THE INHUMANS. I wanted it for the art more than anything, an intriguing mix of European sensibilities (especially on the covers and splash pages) with a kind of George Perez style, economical, no nonsense approach towards propelling the narrative, punctuated with the occasional bravura action set-piece.

Well, this week, they found me three of the four issues (1, 2 and 4, as seen above)... and they let me have them for three bucks a pop! Talk about tenacity! Talk about a deal! Talk about customer service! Thanks, guys, I truly appreciate it.

MARVELS: EPILOGUE
Marvel Comics
Story: Kurt Busiek and Various, Art: Alex Ross and Various

I thought we were all done with Marvel Comics' reprint of their groundbreaking, Alex Ross painted miniseries MARVELS, but it looks like they decided to cap things off with an all-new epilogue, featuring another fully painted tale, set long after the finale of the original series' last issue.

The second half of this issue is jam-packed with cool extras that any fan of the series, the X-Men, Alex Ross or pretty much anything that has anything to do with Marvel Comics is going to want to have in their collection. And if you've held off buying this reprint series because you already have it as original copies and/or one of the collected volumes, you're at least going to want to have this issue to add alongside it, for completion's sake.

HOUSE OF X #1
Marvel Comics
Story: Johnathan Hickman, Art: Pepe Larraz

Well now, this is interesting. In the late 70's/early 80's, the Uncanny X-Men were front and center as part of Marvel Comics' resurgence into the forefront of comic book readers' and superhero fans' hearts and minds. They certainly played a big part in bringing yours truly back to the rack, thanks to their combination of spectacular heroics and diverse roster of characters, from the flamboyance of Nightcrawler to the grimdark heaviness of Wolverine, and from the softhearted powerhouse of Colossus to the relatable teen-aged angst of Kitty Pryde.

This was actually the tail end of the X-Men's heyday, after the awesome heights of the Claremont/Byrne era and before the descent into 90's cash grab proliferation of new X-titles (all featuring Wolverine of course) with their multi-cover foil variant #1 "collector's editions" (with print-runs in the millions, which actually made them the exact opposite of collectible). Personally, I haven't picked up an X-Men book in ages, with the only exceptions being Morrison/Quitely's New X-Men and Whedon/Cassaday's Astonishing X-Men.

Until now.

The hype around House of X (and its sister title, Powers of X) has just been so potent—with Marvel taking the unprecedented step of putting all its other X-titles on hold until these two series are completed—I couldn’t help but get sucked in. So I picked up the first issue, and now that I’ve just finished reading it… I don’t know how I feel about it. Surely that’s what the creators were going for?

First things first, for everyone who complains about how mainstream comics are too “politically correct” these days, House of X works as a pretty bracing corrective. This is a title that, with only one issue under its belt, has explored more politically incendiary and philosophically touchy areas than you’ll find in a week of the average 24-hour news channel’s programming. And the ambiguity of it all can be downright disturbing.

I don’t want to spoil things for anyone, but if you buy comics and you’ve ever had any interest in Marvel’s treatment of the whole mutant-as-metaphor issue, then you should definitely at least pick up this #1 and read it, then decide whether you want to keep up with these series. They’ll be coming at us fast and thick from this point on, with a new issue of either House of X or Powers of X being produced every week until September. Again, I’d love to know what y’all think, down in the comments section. I know it’s a pain to register, but come on, man… I want some COMMENTS!

SILVER SURFER: BLACK #2 (of 5)
Marvel Comics
Story: Donny Cates, Art: Tradd Moore

Wow. With the first issue of this five-issue mini (reviewed in this blog last month), Cates and Moore knocked it right out of the park, past the parking lot, over the interstate, and into parts unknown. If anything, the second issue of this series tops the first in every way possible. 

Visually, it’s even more gorgeous, with Moore’s over-the-top character designs and the fluid kinetics of his action scenes bringing Cates’ outrageously bravura ideas and notions to ultra-vivid life. This book is thrilling in the way that only superhero comics, at their absolute, rule-breaking best, can be. 

If you’re not already on board with this mini—which I suspect will come to be recognized as the single greatest Silver Surfer book ever, bar none, by the time it’s through—what the Christ are you waiting for?! An engraved invitation?! Buy this book! And get a hold of the first issue, now, before it becomes a collector’s item!

LITTLE BIRD #5 (of 5)
Image Comics
Story: Darcy Van Poelgeest, Art: Ian Bertram

From the first issue of this five-issue miniseries, I have made no secret of my love for Little Bird. The story, the artwork, the characters, the world-building, all of it. Now, as the series comes to its climax, although my admiration is undimmed, I can’t help but feel that all the disparate strands were singled up just a little too swiftly, leaving a certain level of uncertainty and confusion in its wake. 

Don’t get me wrong… it’s still well worth owning, sharing, and recommending. And yes, it still stands as the best comic book miniseries that I’ve had the pleasure of reading in a year or so. I’m also probably going to have to go back and read the entire series in one sit-down session to pick up on some of the details that I may have forgotten that would make my reading of the series finale more rewarding. I just find it’s kind of a wasted opportunity to have Little Bird finish out on what on first read seems like sort of a serious downer note. 

But who knows? Maybe I set my expectations too high. Or maybe my first read is somewhat of a mis-read. Please let me know what you all thought of the book, down in the comments section. Anyway, this still counts as a big time RECOMMEND from me. You’ll want to have this series in your collection. Also, the preview for Poelgeest and Bertram’s next offering—Precious Metals—looks pretty great, too.

MEDIA DIARY ~ JUNE 29 to JULY 2, 2019

First up for today's Media Diary? Movies!

XX ~ Two thirds of a hardcore porno? Nah. XX is a horror anthology featuring four short films, all directed by women, hence the XX—as in double-X chromosomes—of the title. The brainchild of former Rue Morgue Editor in Chief Jovanka Vuckovic (who also directs “The Box”, which is the first, and best, short, based on a Jack Ketchum short story), XX works fairly well, with two good shorts (“The Box” and Karyn Kusama’s “Her Only Living Son”), two mediocre ones (“The Birthday Party” and “Don’t Fall”), and some really beautiful Brothers Quay style animated interstitials. Ultimately, I think this would make a good TV or extended film series, and I would definitely watch more, as there is undeniably something unique and intriguing about the female perspective on horror.

ALIEN: COVENANT ~ Yeah, I know. It took me an awful long time to catch this flick, which is odd, because I’m one of the few people I know who actually really enjoyed Prometheus, of which Alien: Covenant is a direct—almost too direct—sequel. The performances are all decent, and there are a handful of impressive characterizations strewn among the many anonymous characters who exist only to be xenomorph chow. And of course, it looks pretty great. Unfortunately, the characters make some of the most incredibly stupid decisions I’ve ever seen characters make in a science-fiction horror film. And that’s saying something. Also, the all-CGI xenomorphs are nowhere near as cool as the original, practical creatures from ALIEN and ALIENS, and even the CGI-enhanced practical creatures from ALIEN 3. Also, am I crazy, or were the creature effects a step down from Prometheus? One good thing about this one, though… Scott didn’t choose to make any of the human characters into convenient bad guy stereotypes. All the characters (the ones given stuff to do anyway) are likable and relatable, dumb decisions aside (PUT ON A FUCKING HELMET WHEN YOU’RE ON AN ALIEN PLANET!!!).

ZOMBIELAND ~ Another one it took a long time for me to watch that I finally got around to. I’m pretty much sick and tired of the whole zombie thing by now—and actually have been for, like, a decade or two (I’ve even got witnesses to this fact)—but a likable cast goes a long way with me, and Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone and Bill Murray are nothing if not likable. It’s funny, cute, relatively exciting, a good ninety-something minutes of time-wasting fun. Certainly not essential, but the sequel is coming out this year (Zombieland Double Tap) so if you’re a fan of the genre, you should probably check it out.

***

And now, this week's comics haul!

THE ANNOTATED MARVELS #1-4

Marvel Comics, writer: Kurt Busiek, artist: Alex Ross

And that's it! All four issues of this marvelous reprint of the gorgeous, trend-setting, ground-breaking, hand-painted mini-series chronicling the Marvel Age from the point of view of the little people who watched from ground level as a new generation of four-color costumed titans duked it out in the name of Good and Evil in the skies and stars above! Especially recommended if you didn't catch this series the first time around in 1994, seeing as it comes complete with a wealth of trivia and background information, including script samples, and a definitive list of the literally hundreds of Easter eggs the creators hid in those handsomely illustrated pages. 

LITTLE BIRD #4

Image Comics, Writer: Darcy Van Poelgeest, artist: Ian Bertram

You all already know how I feel about this wonderful mini-series. With this, the penultimate issue, the creators continue to outdo themselves. All the pieces are set up for the final confrontations and ultimate revelations, and the nature of the mysterious past cataclysm that transformed the world into the nightmare theocracy is poised to be revealed. One month to go for the thrilling conclusion, and I can't hardly wait! 

X-MEN GRAND DESIGN: X-TINCTION #2

Marvel Comics; Writer/Artist: Ed Piskor

Basically the sixth issue of a planned eight issue "grand narrative" of the X-men, Piskor's task was already becoming all but impossible with the last issue. This issue really is a mess, and it's not Piskor's fault at all. He was given the job of creating a gourmet meal out of a dog's breakfast, and it just... doesn't... work. I mean, Cable? Bishop? All that bullshit? The WORST era of X-men ever. I won't be picking up the final two issues, unless they turn out to be something special... which I doubt. Anyway, it'll be good to shrink my pull list and save a few bucks.

***

And, finally for today, a Graphic Novel.

THE FURRY TRAP
by Josh Simmons

Josh Simmons’ The Furry Trap is a beautiful hardcover collection featuring some of the most demented, perverse, vile, and downright disturbing sequential narrative artwork ever committed to paper. Simmons has been producing comics for over a decade now, first gaining attention for his weird and subtle black and white indie one-shot House, and ever since then building a reputation for himself as one of the most uncompromising comics creators at work today.

Collecting most of his short comics from a number of smaller independent anthologies, The Furry Trap serves as a fantastic showcase for Simmons’ mastery of myriad visual styles—from the clean and colorful funny book cartooning of “In a Land of Magic”, to the small, fuzzy, sketchy style of “Night of the Jibblers”—as well as his ability to tell all kinds of tales—from the Freudian nightmare logic of “Cockbone” to the surreal, wordless Apocalypticism of “Jesus Christ”.

Be warned, however… The Furry Trap is definitely NOT for everybody. In fact, I have to wonder about the legality of some of these stories. Simmons isn’t shy about letting his id run rampant via his work, as in, for instance, “In a Land of Magic”, where the protagonist, an elf of some sort, dispatches a villainous warlock and his evil pet dragon first by disemboweling the fire-breathing beast, then paralyzing the warlock with a sharp shot to the neck, after which he… well, there’s no nice way to put this. He rapes the warlock in one of the most vicious displays of sexual sadism I’ve ever seen portrayed in comics. Then there’s “Night of the Jibblers”, where children are murdered horribly just for being overly curious. And finally, the last story of the collection, “Demonwood”, doesn’t actually show any violence, but the story is so chillingly effective and so masterfully structured, it ends up being one of the book’s most disturbing tales, regardless.

If The Furry Trap sounds like something that might appeal to you, and if you think you’ve got what it takes to absorb this level of twisted insanity and walk away with your sense of self intact, then why not head on over to Amazon.com and purchase a copy (using this link of course, so I get a shekel in my begging cup)? The only thing you’ve got to lose is your mind.

MEDIA DIARY, MONDAY, JUNE 17, 2019

After finishing Cows last week, I started reading a novel that I've been meaning to read for a while now: Paul Beatty's much-ballyhoo'd satirical take on the Black California experience, The Sellout. I'd heard so much about this book, which was the first novel by an American—not just an African American—to win the prestigious Man Booker Prize, that I figured it couldn’t possibly be as good as its hype. Well, I’m about a hundred pages in, and so far, it’s better. I’ll get into why and how that is, once I’m finished reading it.

***

Right! On to comic books, then. Last Thursday, I had three books waiting for me in my pull file at The Beguiling. First up…

THE INVADERS #6
Marvel Comics
Story: Chip Zdarsky, Art: Carlos Magno

This series started out okay, with decent art and a story with some potential—I was particularly enthusiastic about the prospect of bringing the original, android Human Torch back into Marvel continuity, as I’ve always felt he was criminally underutilized, with a rich, intriguing backstory. However, the first arc, ending this issue, turned out to be seriously underwhelming, with a HUGE amount of build-up (in this title and others) wherein Marvel has been trying to set up Namor as a world-threatening force on the scale of Worldbreaker Hulk (from the World War Hulk storyline), and sorry, but it just ain’t happening.

Sure, Namor’s got the powers to be a real threat, and I can see how it might work on paper. However, as per usual, whenever Marvel tries to outright “heel” the Submariner, he comes across like a surly Eurotrash male model who can barely contain his contempt for the weak and stupid surface dwellers “with their Frankfurter sausages and pathetic inability to breathe underwater” or something. 

For five issues now, Zdarsky has woven a complex, mysterious tale full of espionage, intrigue, and hidden history. He had the Winter Soldier and Captain America engaging in high-risk underwater reconnaissance, but kept whatever they discovered vague and ill-defined because he didn’t want to spoil the surprise of the Big Reveal at the climax. He even went and retconned Namor’s “amnesiac” period, which has been an important part of the narrative carry-over from the Silver Age to the Marvel Age. 

And for what? What was the Big Reveal? I won’t spoil it for you, except to tell you that it involves one small coastal town in the state of Maine… and me removing this title from my pull list. Bottom line? I think this is the fourth attempted Invaders reboot that I’ve had to give up on in the last ten years. I won’t get fooled again. Probably.

***

X-MEN GRAND DESIGN: X-TINCTION, #1 (of 2)
Marvel Comics
Art/Story by Ed Piskor

Hip-Hop Family Tree indie comics sensation Ed Piskor’s ongoing project aiming to re-tell the entire X-Men saga as one long, continuous narrative has finally reached the point in that team’s storied publishing career where doing so begins to be extremely difficult, considering this was the era when the X-titles began to proliferate, and different writers were being allowed to take different X-teams—just a couple at first, then a small handful, most of which featured Wolverine somehow—in all sorts of divergent, impossible-to-reconcile directions.

It’s also the point at which X-Men became way more of a soap opera than it heretofore had been, with disastrous romantic triangles and star-crossed love stories a-plenty, characters making stupid decisions based on silly reasons, really convenient “magic” popping up whenever it’s needed to close a plot loophole, etc, etc. It was a time, it seemed to me, when longtime series writer Chris Claremont was getting bored of it all. 

Personally, even though it was the X-Men who got me back into collecting comics in the early 80’s, I really dislike this particular, post #200 era of the team. Therefore, I’m probably not the best person to be reviewing it. Here’s a link to a review by a chap who freaking LOVED this era, for those of you who want to know what an enthusiast thinks. 

I’ll be picking up the second issue of this two-parter, regardless (all three of Piskor’s series published so far—Grand Design, Second Genesis, X-Tinction—have been two issues long, as is the planned fourth series), because it’s a good deal for the money, it’s a handy reference guide to the X-Men’s fictional history, and I love the continuity guides contained at the back of each issue. I’m telling you right now though, I have NO IDEA how he’s going to figure out a coherent history for book two of this series, and in particular the planned fourth series. He’s going to have to leave so much out, some fans are bound to be upset. Like, how’s he going to deal with Morrison and Quitely’s New X-Men book? Or Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men?! It’s going to be a logistical nightmare.

***

SILVER SURFER: BLACK #1 (of 5)

Marvel Comics
Story: Donny Cates, Art: Tradd Moore

Wow. Now we’re getting somewhere! Every single element of this beautiful new title is fan-damn-tastic. 

In an editorial note Cates includes at the end of this issue, he talks about being hired to write this title a while back and starting to work on the first issue, only to learn shortly thereafter that Stan Lee had passed away. 

It was no secret, of course, that Stan’s favorite character was the Silver Surfer. He said so many times. Upon hearing of Lee’s death, Cates says he took all the work he’d done to that point and destroyed it. He wanted to start from scratch, and create a story that was worthy of Stan Lee’s legacy, as his own, personal way to honor the man. I have to say, with his partner in art, Tradd Moore, Cates has definitely succeeded in doing just that. 

Silver Surfer: Black is everything a great Silver Surfer story should be; it’s tragic, poetic, heroic, beautiful, kinetic, and its pages are fairly vibrating with the Power Cosmic! As I did with other recent, superlative comics—namely Sobek and Little Bird—as soon as I finished reading this comic, I flipped to page one and read it again. It’s that good. BUY THIS BOOK!!!

***

Okay, so, what other “media” have I been grooving on this week? Well, TV-wise, I watched the third and fourth installments of HBO’s really quite amazing miniseries Chernobyl. Only one episode to go, and I’m at a loss as to where they can go from the end of episode 4. I’ll for sure be watching, anyway.

Across the pond, a new series starring one of my favorite performers, Matt Berry, has launched. Called Year of the Rabbit, it’s a hybrid of police procedurals and sitcoms, set in the Victorian era. Berry plays a brutal, thuggish copper named Rabbit, a London police inspector who looks almost as cruel as he behaves. 

In the first episode, Rabbit and his young rookie sidekick—forced upon him by a stereotypically constipated commanding officer, whose adopted daughter aims to be the first female (and Black) “lady-filth” on the London force—hunt down the murderer of a Parisian show-girl who was shot twice, then dumped into the Thames. East End squalor, full frontal nudity, quasi-Masonic symbolism and a visit with John Merrick, the Elephant Man, ensue, occasionally giving this series the feel of a loose adaptation of the classic Alan Moore graphic novel, From Hell. 

Anyway, I fuckin’ loved it, and can’t wait for the next episode.

Until next time!

MEDIA DIARY, MONDAY-FRIDAY, JUNE 3-7, 2019

Hey folks! Sorry I’ve been remiss in keeping up with my reading/media diary. Other responsibilities keep getting in the way. Of course, my absence from these pages doesn’t mean that I haven’t been devouring a steady stream of media—my reviews of all three episodes from the fifth season of Black Mirror are already posted, below—but still, I said I’d try to do daily updates, and once more, alas and alack, I have failed you. Oh well… on to this week’s mini-reviews!

***

COWS
by Matthew Stokoe

A few years back, I decided to try and find—and read—the most horrifying, disgusting, haunting, disturbing, downright traumatizing novel that I could get my hands on. It was part of an exercise, a challenge of sorts that I put to myself as a would-be writer of horror fiction. I wanted to find writing that did for literature what the New French Extremity has done for cinema since the dawning of the new millennium. And then, I wanted to figure out the techniques employed by said author, borrow them, then hone and/or amplify them, all so that I could eventually write my own stories, become a “success de scandale”, make a bundle of money, inspire a devoted cult of followers who would do whatever I ask of them, and ultimately take over the world.

Ambitious, yes, but a boy has to dream.

Anyhoo, one book that kept popping up on lists of deranged texts was Cows, the relatively short (206 pages) 1997 debut novel by British author Matthew Stokoe.

So I ordered it up from Amazon. And I read it. And, yeah… it’s pretty goddamn fucked up.

Cows is about a pathetic guy named Steven who lives with—and despises—his mother, whom he refers to as “the Hagbeast”. Steven also has a beloved pet dog, named Dog, who has to drag his hind legs behind him because of a broken back (the Hagbeast’s doing). The three of them live in an awful, stinking flat on the outskirts of an unnamed industrial city in England, being awful together. Steven believes the Hagbeast has been trying to kill him for his entire life, mostly by purposely feeding him inedible meals, which she always eats right alongside him.

As the novel opens, however, things are looking up for Steven (although this is definitely relative). After getting his hands on a television set, Steven develops a sense of hope and possibility from the way the people on his favorite shows live their lives. Basing his decision to rebuild his life on the examples they provide, Steven decides to become normal.

With that goal in mind, Steven goes out and gets his first job… operating the grinder at a local slaughterhouse/meat processing plant. There, an individual by the name of Cripps takes him under his wing and introduces him to a new philosophy, a new way of seeing the world, of being in the world. It begins with something sacred and transformative… the First Kill.

“These are your future, if you have the courage. They grow them in concrete boxes under ultraviolet light, they feed them on pellets of their own dead. These are urban cows, boy, man-made without mystery, and they have a gift for us far more important than meat or leather. It isn’t a gift they like to give, though. Not at all.” 

“What gift?” 

“The experience of killing. Of blowing out their brains and taking away their most precious thing. It smashes the walls you put around yourself, the walls other people put around you to stop you doing what you want. Do you understand me? The things you would do if there was nothing to stop you. Killing is an act of self-realization, it shows a man the truth of his power. And when you know this, boy, the pettiness they try to shackle us with falls away like shit.” 

Cripps threw his arms out like he was on a cross. 

“Killing frees you to live as you should.”

In short order, with a little help from Cripps (and a pneumatic skull-punch), Steven has performed his first kill… and it works. Cripps’ dangerous advice leads to Steven being reborn in blood as a Man of Action. It even gives him the confidence to engage with Lucy, an upstairs neighbor whom he’s long fancied.

For her part, Lucy mostly cozies up to Steven because she needs someone to help her operate the colonoscope she’s had smuggled out of a nearby hospital in order to prove to herself and others that her medical delusions aren’t just a figment of her imagination. But Steven doesn’t care. He believes that he needs a wife to be normal, like the people on TV, and he’s also confident that he can make Lucy want to be normal as well.

There remains one substantial obstacle to all this normalcy, however… the Hagbeast. Tackling her will be the great challenge of his life, necessitating his initiation into ever-higher degrees in the ultimate Secret Society of Killing, degrees far above anything Cripps can offer him. That’s when Steven turns to a new mentor… the Guernsey. And that’s when things get crazy.

From beginning to end, Cows is monstrous and grotesque. On more than one occasion, I was forced to stop reading, lest I become physically sick. The behaviors portrayed are lunatic. There are graphic, detailed descriptions of animal cruelty on an epic scale, torture, rape, murder, cannibalism, coprophilia, self-harm, suicide, and bestiality.

And yet, despite all that, it’s also surprisingly well written, and serves as an insightful meditation on the negative dialectics of authority and hierarchy. Furthermore, Stokoe’s subsequent novels have gone on to be translated into multiple languages, earn critical plaudits from esteemed peers, and win prestigious international literary awards.

So what are we to make of Cows? Did it live up to the hype? Did I learn anything from it? Will I be able to steal Stokoe’s techniques and bend them to my will in future stories of my own? Maybe. Who knows? Who cares? Probably not enough people to keep this review going any longer. And so, with that, I bid you… COWS!

***

SOBEK

By James Stokoe

Shortbox Comics, 2019

What’s this? Another Stokoe?! Yes, but a different one this time, not Matthew, the insane novelist, but James, the insanely talented comics creator who has brought us such beautiful books as Godzilla in Hell, ALIEN: Dead Orbit, and Orc Stain.

Sobek is a one-off from Short Box, a unique UK comics outfit with a box-based, or seasonal, non-subscription subscription model that I confess to not really understanding. Thankfully, that’s not a problem, seeing as my favorite comics shop, Toronto’s inimitable The Beguiling, has plenty of copies for sale.

Combining gloriously detailed line-work and a gorgeous coloring job on thick and sturdy archive-quality paper, Sobek is a thing of beauty, coming frightfully close to the Platonic Ideal of what every comic book should aspire to be.  I mean, just look at this splash-page!

The story is as simple as it is entertaining. The evil Egyptian god Set has invaded the city of Shedet, of which the benevolent crocodile god Sobek is the legendary protector. Set has taken up resident in Sobek’s temple, so a small group of citizens travel to Sobek’s mystical lair to let him know, and to beseech his aide. Sobek agrees, and they all make their way back down the Nile, where Set and Sobek face off.

The comedy in this book stems mostly from the characterizations, both verbal and visual. Now, I have no idea if Sobek really was the Dude Lebowski of the Egyptian pantheon, but it works out delightfully in this comic. The same goes for Set being portrayed as a cracked-out Wile E. Coyote type.

Bottom line, if you can get your hands on this book, by all means, BUY IT. I've read it through three times now, and I have yet to grow tired of it.

***

OCCULT PRESENCE

By Paqaru, Floating World Comics

The debut, digest-sized monograph by Spanish artist Paqaru, in which he creates paradoxically primitive yet fascinating environments that extend outwards in an almost mathematical way, then populates them with all manner of characters, from predator and prey, masters and slaves, acolytes and penitents, animals, monsters, people and ghosts. Paqaru’s dreamscapes and nightmarish architectures lend themselves surprisingly well to meditative wanderings, and serve as powerful creativity prompts. I would definitely buy a second volume of these artworks, and I’m excited to see what this young artist comes up with next.

MEDIA DIARY, SUNDAY JUNE 2, 2019

Today, aside from updating all four of my blogs, some substantially (Daily Dirt Diaspora, this one) and some, less so (Kubrick U, Useless Eater), I watched a couple of movies.

First up, the found footage, supernatural horror flick The Taking of Deborah Logan. You may have read about how this movie suffered from dismal preview audience ratings and was dumped by its distributor, only to be snatched from the bloody jaws of total obscurity upon finding its way to Netflix, where—surprise, surprise!—it found its audience.

All in all, it’s far from a classic, but it is a very effective, if workmanlike, specimen of its genre. And it does have a few elements that push it into the realm of being recommendation worthy.

For one, it’s chock-full of jump scares, which makes it a great date night movie. Also, it’s got some genuinely uncanny moments, guaranteed to inspire chills in all but the most stoic of viewers. And, most importantly, it’s got a legitimately awesome, courageous, balls-to-the-wall performance by the wonderful Jill Larson, who is utterly believable, both as an upper middle class matriarch dealing with the ravages of Alzheimer’s, and as a terrifying hag, possessed by the evil spirit of a serial murderer of children, a practicing black magician who was the town pediatrician way back in the day, before he disappeared off the face of the Earth.

A word of advice: If you’re thinking of watching The Taking of Deborah Logan, please refrain from researching it first. Every article about it seems hell-bent on revealing the best scenes, totally robbing them of their shock value. You’re going to want to go into this one fresh, trust me.

Next up, I watched Vox Lux, a film in which Natalie Portman plays Celeste, a talented, gentle, guileless young girl who gets swept up in the wake of a Columbine-style tragedy and rides it all the way to Lady Gaga-level mega-celebrity status. Jude Law plays the savvy producer who spots her potential early on, and both give career-best performances.

Written and directed by actor-turned-auteur Brady Corbet, who last gave us the magnificent Childhood of a Leader, Vox Lux also serves as the final offering from recently deceased musical genius Scott Walker, who provided powerful, experimental scores for both of Corbet’s films. Willem Dafoe provides sporadic “God’s Eye” narration, reminiscent of Kubrick’s use of this technique in such differing films as The Killing, Dr. Strangelove, and Barry Lyndon.

Vox Lux is nothing if not lofty in its ambitions, exploring as it does such varied topics as the continually evolving nature of celebrity in our surveillance-saturated, post-9/11, social media Panopticon world, as well as the moral issues involved in exploiting tragedy (or, for that matter, other people’s talents) for personal gain. It’s a film that asks what we all owe each other—friends, family, partners, strangers—in terms of responsibility as fellow human beings, being.

The reviews for Vox Lux were befuddlingly mixed for such a substantial, ambitious, and (I would argue) successful work of cinema. I suspect it suffered from comparisons to the widely-lauded A Star is Born. Or perhaps some of the critical ambivalence towards it might have to do with the last act, which definitely represents an extended formal detour from that which it follows. Despite this, Vox Lux is one of the more impressive films that I’ve seen in a long while. However, just as with The Taking of Deborah Logan, the less you know about it going in, the better.

READING DIARY, MONDAY/TUESDAY, MAY 20/21, 2019

When it comes to magazines, I’ve been in love with them all my life. My first love was Cracked, followed shortly thereafter by Famous Monsters of Filmland. Then, as my age hit the double digits, I started getting into MAD, National Lampoon and Fangoria. My mid-teens saw me getting into OMNI, Heavy Metal, Creepy and Eerie.

As I transitioned from high school to university, I discovered Michael J. Weldon's incredible Psychotronic Video (full archive) and added SPY to my regular reading mix. By the time I graduated, I was a regular reader of Harper's, and when I moved to Toronto I started reading the excellent multidisciplinary intellectual digest The Baffler, the formally innovative literary quarterly McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, and the funniest goddamn magazine in the world, the half-comics/half-satire/all-hilarious VIZ, home to Sid the Sexist, the Fat Slags, the Drunken Bakers, and countless other ongoing works of demented genius.

I bring this up because it’s become almost impossible to track down newsstand copies of VIZ in Toronto nowadays. They used to carry it at International News shops, but now, they only do so sporadically, and at fewer and fewer locations. That’s why, a couple months ago, I decided to bite the bullet and subscribe... just like David Bowie!

And so, this week, after the obligatory 8 to 10 week waiting period... I got my first issue of VIZ in the freaking mail! And folks, let me tell you... issue #285 is glorious. It's, like, the Platonic Ideal of what an issue of VIZ should be. Eventually, I'll probably get around to writing something more substantial about this magnificent rag. I may even try to convince some of you to subscribe along with me! Or I might just have something to say about my favorite strips ("Drunken Bakers" and anything written by Barney Farmer), the best fake letters and "Top Tips" ("Empty paracetamol blister packs make ideal cryogenic freezing chambers for ants"), or other comedy tours-de-force (like this edition's feature, "Sherlock, Eamonn or Big John... Who is the Best Holmes?"). For now, however, let's just move on...

To the rest of my non-reading media consumption diary for the day! So, what did I watch on these two days? Well, I finally got around to seeing this year's Pet Sematary remake. As a great admirer of Stephen King's darkest novel by far—and as a qualified fan of Mary Lambert's 1989 film version—I don't think the filmmakers did an adequate job of justifying this film's existence. The actors are all decent (with the lone standout performance being Jeté Laurence's), the cinematography is adequately spooky, the score is sufficiently goosebump-inducing. There's nothing in particular that's wrong with the movie. It's just that we've already seen it, presented in pretty much the exact same way, with the sole exception of a highly effective mid-film tweaking of the source material that comes surprisingly close to redeeming this effort... until the film ultimately reverts to type and squanders all that disturbing new potential. I won't go into detail, but you'll know what I mean, if and when you watch.

Speaking of horror, I also watched the first two episodes of HBO's 5-part miniseries Chernobyl, a prestige TV dramatization of the 1986 Soviet nuclear power plant disaster in Ukraine. Chernobyl, of course, was an insane moment in our species' history, probably ranking just a few notches beneath the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, and (arguably) a few above the assassinations of JFK, RFK and MLK on the consequences scale. Furthermore, in terms of potential consequences, it leaves all those events in the metaphorical, radioactive dust. It's also one of the few historical events that actually unfolded like an apocalyptic horror narrative.

The first two episodes of this HBO series are, in a word, amazing. The attention to detail is spectacular, as are the performances from the vast, uniformly stellar cast of actors, known and unknown. Also, if you're at all interested in the history behind the show, HBO has a podcast that you can listen to after each episode, expanding upon details and divergences from reality on an episode-by-episode basis. It's a pretty good podcast in its own right.

Bottom line? By two episodes in, HBO's Chernobyl has the potential to become a crown jewel of this so-called Golden Age of Television that we're allegedly in the middle of these days. It's TV that educates, but also doesn't feel like homework. I have a feeling it's going to win all the awards, and I'm looking forward to the next three episodes.

YER OLD PAL JERKY'S READING DIARY, FRIDAY, MAY 10, 2019

I want to write more, so that means reading more. I find that reading not only inspires me in terms of sparking new story ideas, it also helps me learn new techniques for achieving certain effects (something that is particularly important in the genres in which I wish to write: horror, speculative fiction, “the weird”). Unfortunately, thanks to the fact that my brain has been drilled full of holes thanks to our multi-tasking, attention-deficit-disordered way of life, I find that a lot of what I read goes in through my eyes and then rapidly exits my skull like steam schfitzing from my ears or something.

Of course, being a lifelong English Major, in the Garrison Keillor sense, I won’t be limiting my reading to short horror fiction. However, I’ve been reading a LOT of that stuff lately, so it’s probably going to be taking up a lot of room at the start. What I hope to do with this reading diary is to make note of the things I liked/didn’t like/loved/despised about the stories and novels that I read. I will also make note of any intriguing techniques or tricks that I might come across.

Well, that’s probably enough introductory babble for now. Know that I’ll be taking notes on stories in the various anthologies I’ll be reading in a piecemeal manner, reviewing a number of stories at a time. On the other hand, with the novels that I read, I will try to keep my notes on those together, even if I read said novel over an extended period of time during which I read multiple other short stories, comics, novellas, etc.

Let’s get started with the most recent edition of what is reputed to be the finest ongoing collection of Lovecraftian and/or Cthulhu Mythos fiction, editor S.T. Joshi’s Black Wings series.

*** 

BLACK WINGS OF CTHULHU 6
Twenty-One New Tales of Lovecraftian Horror, Edited by S.T. Joshi

“Pothunters” by Anne K. Schwader ~ Interesting story about field anthropologist Cassie Barrett, who specializes in native cultures of the American Southwest, getting a mysterious package from her assistant Frank Yellowtail’s nephew, Joshua, informing her about a dig site being looted of its unprecedented cache of uniquely constructed and decorated pottery found hidden in sealed-off cavates in the high desert. But looting by meth-addicted “pothunters” is the least of what’s going on at the site, and Schwader does a good job of establishing Cassie as someone who’s dealt with otherworldly forces before, peppering the text with references to terrifying past events at “Zia House”, or the need to bring along her absent mentor’s mysterious “box”. It’s almost as if this is a chapter from a larger novel, or Cassie Barrett is a character who features in multiple linked short stories. Either way, she makes for a unique entry in the pantheon of “Lovecraftian heroes”, and this ends up being an effective horror in the investigative/adventure genre, featuring classic Lovecraftian creatures, the identity of which any seasoned Lovecraft fan will be able to identify relatively early on. Not that this lessens the pleasure of this tale. Particularly recommended for young and female readers.

“The Girl in the Attic” by Darrell Schweitzer ~ A dark, disturbing bit of prose describing in lyrical but horrific ways what appear to be bits and pieces from a lifetime’s worth of memory going through the mind of a young woman (or perhaps the ghost of a young woman?) chained in the attic of a lonely, abandoned house in the woodlands of rural Pennsylvania… a woman who is simultaneously an organized cult’s sacrificial offering, and something like the larval form of a horrifying deity yet to be born. As her memories move from the mundane and familial towards the cruel and unavoidably horrific, the reader is subjected to some tough imagery. “The Girl in the Attic” is chilling and effective, but the ultimate effect is beautifully elusive in its treatment of the story’s central mystery.

“The Once and Future Waite” by Jonathan Thomas ~ Set in the 1980’s, in that most famous of Lovecraftian settings—Arkham Asylum—this story starts off as an investigation into a cell that seems to be haunted. Patients are complaining of flying insects trying to drill their way into their heads, and also of visions of a spooky, bearded man floating above them. Doctor Meg Kilduff, already miffed at being passed over for the job of director after her previous boss’ departure, begrudgingly investigates the room’s past, as per the new director’s orders. It’s at this point that Lovecraftian Easter Eggs (the first of which is in the story’s title) start flying at the reader fast and furious. With themes as varied as Reaganomics, postfeminism, sexual assault and the politics of mental health, this story ends up being an intriguing “serial possession” ghost story, with a final twist that will surprise, a final image that will disgust, and a final line that should put a smile on the reader’s face.

“Oude Goden” by Lynne Jamneck ~ An interesting short piece about a young, self-described “witch” in the Pacific Northwest, set in the 1920’s or so. The title is Dutch for “Ancient Gods”, with the ancient god in this case being Ghanatothoa (first offspring of Cthulhu according to some readings, Lin Carter’s in particular). Seems as though the protagonist’s lover, Jupiter, as well as other “outsiders” (homosexuals for the most part) from a small Seattle suburb are all disappearing. So, she sets out to solve the mystery. For such a short story, “Oude Goden” has an interesting cast of characters, including a sub-continental merchant with a deep understanding of the occult and a sideline in bootleg First Nations alcohol and super-potent hallucinogenic entheogens, a floppy-eared nocturnal rabbit who happens to harbor the soul of a hundred-years-dead Dutchman, the KKK, a phantom college of witches, and an arrogant, doomed young travelling warlock whose ultimate purpose in this story remains mysterious. Jamneck has also gifted us with a new book to add to the Mythos library: “Dhol Chants”, which contains incantations so potent that the reader needs to take arcane steps in order to prevent the triggering of uncontrollable effects simply by opening the book to certain pages! Decent short story.

***

LITTLE BIRD #2 of 5

Story by Darcy van Poelgeest, Art by Ian Bertram

The first issue of this instant classic comic book was so utterly superlative, it inspired me to write my first fan letter to a comic book creative team since the mid-1980’s. I guess I’ve got pretty good taste in comics, because since its debut, Little Bird has experienced unprecedented word of mouth success, leading to a swift sell-out and forcing Image Comics to print a second, and then a THIRD run… all before the second issue was even released. A dark future fantasy sf dystopia with elements of Native American lore, over the top superheroics, Jodorowsky-style mytho-messianic mysticism and utterly sui generis character designs, Little Bird is so far telling a somewhat familiar tale, but oh, the way it’s being told! I simply can’t wait to see where this creative team takes this magnificent comic.