Boston Brand, the Fearless Deadman, is summoned to a creepy Victorian Mansion by a woman seemingly in distress. Only this lady is a ghost and once Deadman enters the domicile, he finds himself trapped, not only unable to leave the building but now unable to past through walls. Obviously, Deadman is trapped. But he’s found a way to travel the house, as the girlfriend of the mansion’s new owner, Berenice, can see him. However, she can’t she the dark menace that is threatening her and her lover. Now the two must team together if they have any hope of discovering the secrets of the Dark Mansion of Forbidden Love.
The Dark Mansion of Forbidden Love was a short lived horror anthology series that had a bent towards Gothic love stories. Starting in 1971, the romance angle was scrapped after only 4 issues and rebranded Forbidden Tales of Dark Mansion. But an already over-saturated market of horror comics was too much for this struggling title and it was cancelled after 15 issues.
Deadman is a B-list character of the DC Universe that’s become a bit of a cult favorite. Great art by Neal Adams and Jim Aparo and some pretty epic team-ups with Batman has made the character a 70s legend. Having read and collected quite a few Deadman comics as well as the Showcase Presents treasury of Dark Mansion/ Sinister House titles, I was intrigued when this book was announced a few weeks ago.
Let’s talk about the artwork first. There’s an almost painted quality to the pages crafted by Lan Medina (District X). The faded tones make the scenes a little more spooky and I felt like I was watching the opening act of an old scary movie from the 70s on a projector or fuzzy TV set. I really enjoyed it.
Now, the story. There’s a great mystery here- 3 actually. 1) Why is Deadman trapped? 2)Why can Berenice see Deadman? 3) What’s the sinister secret to the mansion? There’s some other minor plot points but they are such surprises, I don’t want to spoil them. And for these reasons along, I am interested in coming back to this series at some point. But as with many mysteries, not everything is clear- YET!
But the series runs for $5.99 per issue. The plus side is that this book, which is 48-pages, is presented in prestige format and is ad free. But, still, for a bargain hunter like myself $6 is still pricey. So, I may wait for this to be collected to finish out the story. But if money was not an issue, I’d been getting every issue new on the day it would drop.
A Gothic love story set in the modern day with some spooks, chills, and things to go bump in the night.
Worth Consuming
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