A couple of days ago, I praised Asylum Press for their 2021 Vampires Halloween Special that was devoted to pre-code horror stories about bloodsuckers. Pumped by the quality of that special, last night I dove into the Eeek! Halloween Special from Asylum. Unfortunately, I didn't have the same level of satisfaction with this 2021 special.
Eeek! is designed to look like black and white horror magazines of the 1970s like Creepy and Vampirella. Written and illustrated primarily by Jason Paulos (Hairbutt the Hippo), there are 3 stories in this one-shot.
In 'The Green Fairy', as a painter drowns himself in a bottle of Absinthe, he reflects on the ups, downs and mistakes of his life. With 'Sick Joke', an upper crust couple go on vacation in hopes of rekindling their troubled marriage and run afoul of a horrible family of hillbillies. Lastly in 'False Alarm', a lonely man calls 911 one time too many in a twist on the boy who cried wolf legend.
'The Green Fairy' was pretty good at least in terms of its twist ending and sexy artwork. But it rambled on a little too long. It probably could have been 3-4 pages shorter than it was.
'Sick Joke' was a complete mess. The ending was unbelievable in my opinion, the addition of a new character midway through the story was kinda implausible and it too was just way too long.
'False Alarm' was the best story of the three. That could be because Jason Paulos doesn't write the tale. It's crafted by Jason Crawley (Bloke's Terrible Tomb of Terror) and flows much better than the previous two stories.
There's also a one-pager that looks at the differences in monster attacks between the sexes. I've never though of it before, but wrtier Dan Cox (Hitsville UK) might be on to something. Women mostly get mauled by vampires and mutant creatures while men are attacked by beasts like werewolves. But no matter who you are, nobody is safe from the vilest of creatures- the lawyer!
The reason I purchased this book last year was because this was a recommendation by my favorite LCS. Every once in a while the guys there order something I wasn't even aware of because they know that I'm all about holiday comics! It wasn't a bad offering. It just lacks the oomph that the other Asylum Press special that I read a couple of days ago. It very well could be because this is all-new stuff paying homage to horror legends and I go more for the classic stuff that came from the original source material.
Worth Consuming!
Rating: 7 out of 10 stars.
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