Thread 150922215

It's Halloween month. Let's talk about horror comics.
Starting off with Al Columbia's Pim and Francie work. I like to read these along with the haunting melodies from the time of this style of cartooning comes from (Fleischer cartoons circa the 1930s), namely The Shining's soundtrack as well music by The Caretaker (who was inspired by The Shining).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qQGTAwLhbY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LL998ajnjN4

It really inspires a kind of hopelessness, doesn't it? Also, there's a skeleton inside you.

Well, shit.

Got a link to the comic?

>>150922215 (OP)
Columbia is a weird guy, The Biologic Show got reprinted but he threw an autistic shitfit about the book design and started going after the publisher and basically severed whatever future partnership he had with them.

>>150924225
Yeah, he's a strange guy.

>>150922215 (OP)
Ooooo scary

Saving this bread before it dies.
I recently started and finished Dwellings. It's a pretty short and sweet comic, and the "classic kid's comic" art style (not really sure what to call it) ended up working pretty well for the grisly stories it had to offer.

>>150924225
This is the endpaper design that caused Columbia's shitfit. In the original Biologic Show issue 1, it was just the one face filling the page. Not sure if there were other planned alterations of the material or if this was the only one

>>150924225
>>150924774
last I heard (about 3 years to be fair) he was on the run from attempted murder (wouldn't be surprised if he tried killing michele nitri for the whole biologic show thing) and was living with a traveling circus. He's almost certainly an unmedicated schizophrenic and is in dire need of help.

>>150922215 (OP)
>>150924225
He's one of those guys who looks like he'd appear in his own stories.

>>150926938
He looks a bit odd, but that's not him. At least, not entirely.

>>150926938
Nah, thats jus photo lighting, but he really does look like the sort of guy who'd write and draw the way he does.

https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/nightmare-tales-build-your-own-graphic-novels-bundle
I purchased this bundle from Fanatical and I've been reading through them (all TPBs or similar length), here are my thoughts so far:
>Children of the Black Sun
Pretty cool, good atmosphere and art, intriguing story, except IT ENDS ON A CLIFFHANGER RIGHT AS THE CLIMAX STARTS AND THEN NEVER CONTINHES
>Kidz
Comfy story about kids surviving in an empty world as the zombie apocalypse winds down due to zombies starving out now that it's been a few months. Apparently continues after the TPB, but the end here feels like a satisfying and conclusive place to stop so it doesn't matter.
>The Boogyman
When a maniac breaks into his home and kills his parents, a little boy begs the monster he thinks lives under his bed for help, deciding it's no longer the scariest thing in the house. He didn't realize it would actually answer.
Nice art (though action scenes feel like they could be a little more readable sometimes, maybe it's just my cramped screen), it feels like they're a bit too short on time to fully inteoduce/explore everything they wanted to with the boogeyman stuff but they still did a good enough job with what they had. Pretty cool story overall.
>King of the Moths
What is the origin of this phrase? It's gotta be from something because I know an album named after it too but google gives me nothing and I'm not much of a mythology buff.
Anyways, the comfy atmosphere here and decent art is all this comic has going for it, because it's kind of nonsense. Starts by following a couple but then some monster made of moths that probably represents relationships ending eats the girl's emotions and then she breaks up with the guy who is never an important character again. He just kind of mopes around aimlessly in the b-plot. Then she teams up with a cop to shoot the moth guy or something. She doesn't even seem to really get back together with her boyfriend at the end, very unsatisfying.

>>150927271
Her and the cop figure out what's going on too fast, and everyone else remains too ignorant and out of the way to have any real bearing on the plot despite it supposedly being about relationships, so I didn't like it much.
>Graveyard Wars
The premise is something about people who can channel a dead person and gain all their skills (like martial arts or expert knowledge or stunt driving) while doing so. Interesting concept. But it kind of just cold opens without giving us context, and once your past the "introduction" it doesn't bring you up to speed afterwards like a well-paced story would. The art is competent, but without actual coloring (pages or panels are monochrome in whatever color they feel suits the mood) and so feels rather plain. It's written in a way where it feels like it was a much larger setting inside the author's imagination and he had to settle on only releasing a smaller part of it, if that makes sense; characters aren't well-established and it feels like he already expects you to think they're cool and care about them.
I haven't gotten too far into it but I only even know what's going on because the blurb on the back tells you the whole spirit powers premise—the story itself has not communicated this at all, and anyone who just dives right in will probably be left scratching their head on why everyone has glowing characters appear behind them doing nothing sometimes or why those characters change between pages. There's also some weird "good guy channelers vs bad guy channelers" conflict that hasn't been properly set up at all. What are their goals or motivations? Who even are any of these characters?
I get that I'm not even halfway in, but even when not everything is explained right away you still have to make it immediately engaging. I'm not likely to keep reading to see if it might eventually start making sense or being good.

Some of these have been good, but I might just go back to reading Hellboy for my spooky month fix.

>>150927271
>>150927295
Interesting.

>>150922215 (OP)
Not that make scary comics out there, unfortunately.

Someone shared Spa by Erik Svetoft here a while ago and I liked it. Things get weirder and more grotesque at this fancy rich spa but the people there either can't believe it or do their best to ignore the signs until it's too late.

>>150928970
I wish the art was better.

>>150927017
odd yes, but I have to say nobody on earth manages to capture the same vibe that he does (or did, who knows at this point)

>haha what if a old timey cartoon was complete filth
riveting

>>150930286
It doesn't come as much of a surprise that he ended up trying to kill someone irl

>>150926880
>>150930185
He did release a book just last year (the second volume of Amnesia.) He also released some sort of ashcan preview called Night of 1000 Staircases, but I can't find much info on that

>>150930286
Shut up, pussy.

>>150931137
I'm very much afraid. Of the pains of hell, primarily.

>>150922215 (OP)
I like the horror portions of Love and Rockets.

Just started reading The Biologic Show, great rec anon. Some parts remind me of Jim Woodring's art a bit.

>>150927176
I wish he finished Big Numbers.

>>150933079
chopping up big numbers with a guillotine was the greatest service he ever did to the comics world

>>150933585
*disservice

>>150922215 (OP)
Let's not.

>>150933823
die mad about it

>>150934626
But you're the one who's angry...

>>150934444
Checked

>>150922215 (OP)
Al Columbia is awesome, glad to see a thread on him here. He has incredible draftsmanship and his art just radiates evil, can't get enough of it.

>>150922215 (OP)
Is there more Pim and Francie or is the Fantagraphics collection all there is to it?

You know I have to post Uno Moralez in a thread like this.
https://unomoralez.com/

>>150935566
Classic.

Boo!

Bump

>>150935540
There's all of those covers that I believe he did for hi-fructose, and a bunch of miscellaneous work, but it's so hard to find a good archive of his art.

>>150935566
Sadly, there is next to nothing there for me.

Anyone else checked out Hobtown Mystery Stories? I think they're a pretty entertaining mix of Scooby Doo/Hardy Boys-style "A group of teenagers try to foil an evil plot" and Twin Peaks type weird shit happening in a small town.

>>150930317
What? I thought the only thing he killed were was Alan Moore's Big Numbers...

>>150927176
How do you go from this...

>>150938753
...To this

Well, we all know how: we are going there

Hell yes this is the sort of thread I love to see around this time of the year. Lots of good recommendations, never even heard of Al Columbia before but he's definitely on my read list now.

American Mythology Has several Licensed movie adaptation minis and one-shots:
Night Of The Living Dead
Return Of The Living Dead
Silent Night, Deadly Night
Fright Night
Ghoulies
Hatchet
Willie's Wonderland

Plus a lot of other original horror comics, mostly one-shots.

>>150938788
Already there.

>>150938788
Years of unmedicated schizophrenia.

>>150922215 (OP)
Everyone always talks about Tales from thr Crypt (and for good reason) but I've always been partial to Creepy myself, espeically under the pen of the illustrious Bernie Wrightson.

>>150937907
Click the little words on the side under the artists name.

>>150922516
Is that David Lynch?

>>150941537
It shows how he went out in the end.

>>150937970
He killed his own books many times.

That's it?

>>150944793
Yes

>>150946622
That reminds me, I wanted more of Columbia's Sienkiewicz horror style.

The one horror comic I actively followed (as long as you don't count Chew that is which is borderline in a way)was the Black Monday Murders. An occult detective story that was heavily based on economics.
It was really cool, but hasn't been updated in years and probably will never be finished despite ending on a cliffhanger.

And that reminds me, I loved the webcomic Broodhollow which was done by the Local 58 guy but was also abandoned. You still have three 'arcs' of some pretty interesting horror though so I really recommend checking it out.

>>150948151
Broodhollow had potential, but after book one it just plunged downhill.

>>150948151
>heavily based on economics
seems interesting

>>150948352
>but after book one it just plunged downhill
I don't know I quite liked the one where he thinks he's being manipulated in his sleep to be a murderer.
The ending wasn't as good as the first one because it just sort of ends so damn abruptly.
I forgot there are only 2 books now. He started chapter 3
Then restarted it
Then just removed it.
Now it just ends with these two.

Fuck me, man.

Shit there was a webcomic I remember called June that had this really scrawly style to it. I found a fucking TV tropes page talking about it
that directed to a tumblr backup because Smackjeeves died years ago
And it's fucking dead.
All I have on the waybackmachine is the final page showing the dates of 2010-2013 (the run of the comic) and a small blurb from the artist linking to their socials. That are also all dead.
Does anyone remember this? The main kid was walking around trapped in his house wearing a plastic bag over his head. There were some TV news reports about the the other 'Summer Towns' being flooded.
I think at the ending the art style lost all cohesion as there is a literal schizophrenic meltdown and I think a lot of captured animals are lit on fire and released in a public area.

This scratching any memories?

>>150949264
HOly shit I found it.
Someone backed up (almost) all of Smackjeeves. It's amazing
I'll be looking forward to rereading this in the coming days.
https://archive.org/details/smackjeeves-90624/90624/comic/avatars/04bd7a43f0e5daf8067da6c06509bdf8.png

>>150922215 (OP)
>Horror
>Comics
Oxymoron. How can you be afraid of DRAWINGS?

>>150950365
Exactly this!

>>150949325
I think it starts here:
https://archive.org/details/smackjeeves-90624/90624/comic/pages/chapter_001-1.jpg
Tell if the continiuty on archive is how you remember it

>>150950365
That's pretty scary.

>>150949325
Cool.

Needs more Emily Carroll

https://emcarroll.com/comics/prince/andthesea.html

>>150953868
Oh wow that's a blast from the past. Thanks a lot for the reminder. I always loved her stuff

>>150950365
Images can provoke lust or loathing. Sometimes the same image can provoke both for different people. Why not fear?

DC:
--
House Of Mystery
House Of Secrets
The Unexpected
Weird Mystery Tales
Ghosts
The Witching Hour
Secrets Of Sinister House
Secrets Of Haunted House
Forbidden Tales Of Dark Mansion
tales of ghost castle
Doorway To Nightmare
wasteland
(note House of Mystery started out as horror late golden age then switched to scifi stuff with giant monster and such before switching back to horror late silver along with House Of Secrets and The Unexpected)

Charlton:
--
Ghost Manor
Ghostly Haunts
ghostly tales
The Many Ghosts of Doctor Graves
Haunted
Scary Tales (mostly reprints)
Monster Hunters
Creepy Things
this magazine is haunted
(not counting some golden age stuff and a few others closer to weird fantasy in content)
Midnight Tales*
strange suspense stories*

Gold Key:
--
Boris Karloff Tales Of Mystery
Grimm's Ghost Stories
The Twilight Zone
Ripley's Believe It Or Not
(also the horror-themed The Occult Files Of Dr Spektor and Dark Shadows)

other:
monsters attack!

Marvel's in sort of a weird position where they've a few golden age ones then go into mixed monster/weird tales/superhero anthologies, then a few reprint titles of just the monsters and golden age stuff.

>>150922215 (OP)
Trick r' Treat

>>150935566
Jesus fuck, this is scary...

Would Blast count? Not strictly a horror comic but there were certainly moments in it that left me disturbed.

>>150957975
Some kind of horror, yeah.

>>150957822
How?

>>150957975
You ok Gru? You ain't looking so fresh.

>>150957975
>Gru: Those edibles ain't shi-
>*Taco Bell DONG*

Can someone help me find a horror western comic?

It was an anthology of short scary stories loosely connected. One specific story I remember was a hotel that had an impossible haunted room (it exists somewhere that doesn't have the space). Another story had them going down a well and there were monsters attacking them from the brick walls I think? Also some kind of haunted tree beside a house

Does anyone know what it is?

>>150960819
i dont

>>150960819
bump for interest

>>150922215 (OP)
How scary are the comics material?

This thread is making me want to go look up some Richard Sala comics

>>150963953
Did he do horror?

>>150963587
eh

My favorites.

>>150922215 (OP)
What did you guys think is happening in this story?

The old inventor, in a single panel, mentioned something about time travel. And I think it worked, but not like how he expected. He caused an endless time loop. People were trapped in hell and death wouldn't be a release, that's why you see the same people even after they're murdered. After being trapped long enough everyone is going insane because of it, that's why everyone is turning into killers or warped into literal monsters. Even the child characters turn into sickos that like to torture people to death. The girl somehow found a way to escape the time loop in the end, that's why she vanished.

>>150964813
I don't know how to read.

>>150964418
Yeah. Feel same too.....

>>150959661
T'was merely a jape, the image is unusually saccharine for uno moralez

>>150960819
We talking newer or older?

>>150964758
>From Hell
God I do love that. Really is Alan Moores best work. I was really hoping to pick up the Eternaut omnibus on the Fantagraph liquidation sale but they were all out at the time. Also I absolutely detest the huge netflix logot hat's stamped onto all the new copies and even if it's petty that sort of shit stops me from buying books when the cover is just a huge plug for some movie adaptation.

>>150964813
There is no linear story, it's intentionally kept vague and surreal. It's meant to evoke pieces of something bigger that you'll never be able to get the full picture of, like finding remains of an old comic in the wreck of a house fire or something.

I remember talking with the guy a few years ago and asking some similar questions, and a lot of the "story lines" are either based on dreams or childhood experiences he had. P&F are also loosely based on himself and his ex-wife Francine.

>>150967789
I wish we could have discussion of From Hell the way we do with Watchmen, but it seems a lot of people are turned off by the ahistorical aspects.

>>150957975
One of my favorite comics of all time

>>150968182
Do you have any more insights into his artwork and process?

>>150968981
Based.

>>150923979
23 Skidoo (1994) (Al Columbia) (BeefBoy).cbr
https://mega.nz/file/j8BzGDoC#LKzn1q-oEgqjnyma1kpqgvIvBy_DvSNdf4TA-NrVSW0

Al Columbia - The Biologic Show 00 (1994) (Fantagraphic) (Cello-DCP).cbz
https://mega.nz/file/S4wzWJAY#nnDukTXnGG2BfxDmJYF3f3cmO_UecntF0VKgzcDLJrw

Al Columbia - The Biologic Show 01 (1995) (Fantagraphic) (Cello-DCP).cbz
https://mega.nz/file/j94UyCYb#L_pd8xwE0FIdVw12LEj34W7i8f-fv5Np53WjSifblO0

Amnesia - The Lost Films of Francis D. Longfellow (2018).cbz
https://mega.nz/file/K9wg0LhL#TKNlvjaap1SNPfGRzrE6xZR-8uuSijPLdl6sS7GZ_eI

Doghead (1992) (Al Columbia).cbr
https://mega.nz/file/Ks4iBRLJ#Q67TLOFOP0rowZanfAM9DoWrJ5uU_j7295eFJOU7CYQ

Pim & Francie - The Golden Bear Days (2009) (digital) (Minutemen-dask).cbr
https://mega.nz/file/WkACXTrB#vjf-yGyogQ6mpycFqdPk3H-xJjRY7nUjR-FtTWvwS5w

The Pogostick 01 (Fantagraphics - 2003) (geometrico).cbr
https://mega.nz/file/39oBXbDL#ArkGxL4eLGU3hQOo6lMryUvNFR-XfuPBPgGtunO9T4Y

The Pogostick 02 (Fantagraphics - 2003) (geometrico).cbr
https://mega.nz/file/e8Q3EDjR#yk2x19vm0J2WffeepsKNG6N_SzGnnTEyCdUJEHZ2PRQ

>>150967789
That's a sticker that is removable.

>>150968809
I think the biggest problem is that it's also sort of restrictive. It's a telling of the Jack the Ripper story there interesting but short of the periods of Gull seeing into the future there's not a lot available for dissection or application to talking about. There's no RORSCHACH GOOD MAN banging against authors intention, there was one shitty adaptation that isn't worth the time to talk about. It's the curse of something that's just pretty damn good. Most people can just sort of agree how good it is and that's kind of it if you've read it.

>>150969783
I disagree. I think there's plenty to explore, but it's not for casual discussion. It's the type of talk that requires research, and nobody's really willing to do that on /co/. I've seen /a/ do it in their storytimes, and I'd love to have that here, but we're too different.

>>150968990
He's a very secretive person (the air of mystique surrounding himself is something he very purposefully cultivates and enjoys) and there's a lot of stuff that he divulged to me over a period of time that he made me sort of "swear secrecy" to, and I intend to respect that even still, however there are a few things in which I don't think he'd care if I shared them -

1. Contrary to what his art may suggest, he isn't a satanist. He's a pretty devout christian.
2. Like I said, a big reason for the way his comics are structured is because he likes things to feel dreamlike and obscure. However, there's also the fact that he finds it pretty hard to stay dedicated to a project for more than a few months. He hates working on long, structured storylines and tends to get bored of them too quick to see them through to completion, so it works well for him to just draw a bunch of small snippets and make compilations of them.
2. The "Bloody Bloody Killer" character is based off goofy. Might seem pretty obvious in retrospect but he got a good laugh out of me when he told me that, just because its such a grotesque and horrible character.
3. Big Numbers was dead in the water long before he destroyed the work for it. It was never going to get finished. Some guys in a band he knew thought it would be a cool idea for an album cover to make a collage from a bunch of chopped up pages from big numbers, and he just obliged their idea. As everyone in the studio knew at that point that they were working on a dead project, he thought it was no big deal at the time to "repurpose" some of the work. I guess it was just convenient to let the 19 year old assistant take the fall for what was really the fault of poorly managed finances and Alan Moore's titanic ego.

>>150969718
Thanks!

>>150922215 (OP)
Currently reading the Judge Death Mega Special. lots of fun and good dark humour.

>>150968809
To be fair From Hell is a hard read, the book is DENSE, the art is an acquired taste and the true subject is kinda arcane. If there ever was a book that truly earned the title of "graphic novel" it's that one

>>150930286
Yes

>>150956545
>Marvel's in sort of a weird position where they've a few golden age ones then go into mixed monster/weird tales/superhero anthologies, then a few reprint titles of just the monsters and golden age stuff.

It's kind of because Marvel kept trend-chasing for a while during the 40s and 50s. Then Tower of Shadows in 1969 was done to compete against DC's revived horror-version of House of Mystery and House of Secrets but it didn't sell well enough so they made it a partial reprint title then changed it to Creatures on the Loose. I forget the story about the other 70s horror titles

>>150972401
The only one I really know is Chamber Of Chills, which I gather had a few original stories but was also mostly golden age reprints.

>>150922215 (OP)
I miss Richard Corben so much

>>150967327
Very recent

2020+

Art is more realistic than stylized

>>150970102
>let the 19 year old assistant take the fall
Does anyone really do that? It was clearly Moore and Sienkiewicz' fault.

>>150969718
blessed

>>150974342
They do. People still give him shit to this day for "killing big numbers".

>>150969718
Holy fucking based.

>>150974637
That's nuts.

>>150963953
This reminds me of a recurring feature from the original Liquid Television, is Invisible Hands by the same guy?

>>150969718
>23 Skidoo
>Amnesia - The Lost Films of Francis D. Longfellow
>Doghead
>The Pogostick 01 & 02
I didn't have these ones, thanks!

>>150976268
looks like it

>>150976268
Yeah that's Richard Sala, he's great.