I haven’t had much of a comic budget lately but when I do get extra cash, those sonsabitches had better have an awesome horror theme. Something like House of Mystery or anything from Vertigo. I’m not so hot on crime thrillers, but the supernatural power of this company is always appealing. And it’s only a double-bonus that Cain and Abel from the Sandman series are the hosts of this particular House of Mystery. I picked up the Halloween special the other day and was surprised to run into John Constantine and Madame Xanadu. The local store Second Chance Books and Comics always carries these titles and has been there for me since the beginning.
But then I got around to reading Rue Morgue and heard of a book called FrankenCastle, an awesome vaguely Gothic/Mad Scientist-style re-imagining of the Punisher. Basically it’s set in an alternate reality where this evil Wolverine motherfucker just straight up annihilates the Punisher in battle and takes his head. That’s where the supernatural world takes us in, bats shrieking and fog rolling and bullets firing. There’s an island of monsters where all of the vintage badass Marvel Monsters live, and they operate on Frank Castle’s head, putting his body back together for some super annihilation central. The story only begins here in a Marvel One-Shot edition. Apparently the chaos continues on into several issues, and in addition to a very tight pulp-inspired kind of story, the artwork is amazing. And it’s no wonder, Tony Moore of Walking Dead fame does the art. It’s amazing. The colors jump off the page in a gigantic blood-soaked love note to one of Marvel’s truest badasses.
Archive Page 2
Re-Emergence.
Chemtrails.
The Many Faces of Scylla
I saw this terrifying picture on a horror Flickr group. I’m thinking it’s a wonderful new tattoo idea. What do you think?
My thoughts on Human Centipede.
The controversy first reached me in the pages of the Oklahoma Gazette. This new movie Human Centipede is just too repulsive to be shown in our theatres, but it’s definitely available on InDemand. I decided that it’d been too long since I’ve seen something stomach-churning, something that would really awake that old rotten passion for video nasties that disturb like rancid pumpkin pulp left in a jar in direct sunlight, infesting and overwhelming. Movies like Cannibal Holocaust. Or Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
The movie starts out in a typical way, but I can forgive a typical start, because it’s all archetypes, right? We’re introduced to the Doctor of the film getting up to his killing business, stalking a trucker and bringing him back to the lab for gruesome torture. The Doctor is German , so it’s perfect. If it seems like I forgot the character names, I have. Because, ultimately, they’re not that important. Two girls on a European sex trip get introduced to the story, and after they meet a fat, bald pervert on a dark, abandoned road after getting a flat tire, you know that they will soon be up Shit Creek with no paddle.
They make their way into the dark forest, while the good Doctor’s house/laboratory awaits the opportunity to eat them alive. Dark and strange, the Doctor arrives at the door, and invites them in. Strange artwork surrounds the place, oddly sterile. They are injected with something and brought downstairs while an Asian man has already been experimented on. Turns out this mad doctor wants to create a 3-human creature stitched together, ass-to-mouth-to-ass-to-mouth and you get the picture.
Yeah, he succeeds. Most chilling to me is that a surgeon was brought into this project to give a scientifically accurate way for this atrocity to be performed. I think you can guess the rest. The last half hour of the film takes us by the rest and drags us through shit-streaked water basically , and you might want to shower after this whole ordeal. Not entertaining in a very good way, but perversely enough acts as a dark comedy. There are plans for a trilogy. Not for the weak of stomach.
Heart-Shaped Box
I’ve read the debut novel from Joe Hill, and I have to say that this is the first book in a while that actually gave me the chills. I reserved it for nighttime reading, to get the maximum effect. Most scary books I’ll read any time of day, because it’s seldom a serious scare. But this one is , boys and girls. It’s about a shockrocker named Judas who purchases a soul online. It arrives to his house in a heart-shaped box and immediately begins to hard-core fuck with this guy’s reality. The book goes further and further down the rabbit hole as you eventually learn all the motivations of the characters.
The ghost is the stepfather of a girl that Judas knew in the recent past. Her name was Anna, and she was southern, goth, and stripped for a living. Suffered through extreme depressive bouts where she would stare at the tv for hours… forget to put on clothes… wander the highway completely naked except for a t-shirt. She allegedly slashed her wrists when Judas left her.
This book becomes a journey of the soul as Judas learns more and more of this puzzle. The poetic nature of some of the passages, and the apt description of dream-like events makes this one of the smoothest, most terrifying reads in a while.
A2M
The wait is over for Creepy comics issue number 2. This one is great. I just found out that it’s actually bi-monthly. It includes a couple of awesomely gruesome tales. One by Joe R. Lansdale, with that trademark tough-talking touch. It’s about a troubled man who dies a gruesome death at the hands of nature and fate. The artwork is some of the best in comics, and I feel like how Stephen King must have felt when he was young and reading all those gruesome horror anthology series that started it all.
Also back on the radar is Tank Girl. The new storyline , called Skidmarks, is a hilariously madcap racing adventure centered on a goofy skateboarding accident. What’s even greater is that Jamie Hewlett remains a continually practicing artist. As such, the comic books always have new and craaazy shit going on. If only someone could do an awesome Tank Girl ANIMATED movie. Not that live action one. Can you imagine if somebody took the time and got the budget for an ultimate Tank Girl movie? The crowds, man, the crowds that it would draw!
The Ghost of Barnabas
Don’t you miss the atmosphere of Dark Shadows? It’s going to be Tim Burton and Johnny Depp’s next big project, after Alice in Wonderland.
AFI is coming to Tulsa. Will you be there? They really embrace the darker side of things. At least lyrically. Sing the Sorrow is definitely on my personal top 5 albums of all time. If one looks at the lyrics, they’re taken to poetic depths of despair. The new CD Crash/Love grew on me, and it’s kind of a concept album of the death of romance and the empty souls that everyone has in them to a certain extent.
They are one of the greatest live shows that one can attend. In fact, I’ve seen them 4 times… It’s worth it. November 3rd at Cains. Hope to see you there.
In other news, The Phantom Stranger from DC/ Vertigo. What a character. He’s like The Phantom and The Spirit but with dimensional bending abilities and an occult storyline.. Get into him. There’s a hell of a lot more that I don’t know about him than I do know. A good start is the first graphic novel of Madame Xanadu. All these horror/supernatural/creepy comics are gonna make me go broke sooo much this winter.
Can you dig it?
Snapshot
Ghouls Gone Wild 2009. Me as Adam Ant. Hordes of people who don’t know who the hell Adam Ant is. Oklahoma being the center of the Halloween universe for one solitary night. Revelry. A drunk guy who threatened me with a knife. He told me he’d cut up me and my family. I asked him if he’d take pictures. He said “I’m fucking serious.” It looked like a real knife. Haha. Now I ask, who would want to harm your humble narrator?
In other news, check out the first annual House of Mystery Halloween special. Special guest appearances by John Constantine, Madame Xanadu, and Merv Pumpkinhead from Sandman!
Autumn
Swirling mists arrive
They circle the tombstones now
A corpse starts to rise
It can taste your breath
the safety of the graveyard
is not counted on
No one remembers
you are now just lost in time
to feed the new dead
It's a Gory World Out There! 