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Graphic Novel Review: Frankenstein: Junji Ito Story Collection by Junji Ito

Frankenstein: Junji Ito Story Collection by Junji Ito

Viz Media, 2018

ISBN-13: 9781974703760

Available: Hardcover, Kindle, comiXology

Junji Ito, the master of horror manga, adapts Mary Shelley’s classic, Frankenstein in this graphic collection. Victor Frankenstein is obsessed with creating life from death. He stops at nothing to create his giant, only to be repulsed by his design. Abandoned and angry, the creature takes his revenge on those Victor loves.

I read a few reviews that were critical of Ito’s adaptation, indicating that they felt that adapting Shelley’s novel restricted his horrific artwork and storytelling. I would have to disagree, particularly regarding the art. While it is true Ito is skilled at the grotesque, his ability to draw beautiful characters seems to go unnoticed. For instance, is titular character in Tomie is gorgeous, which I think makes the horrific scenes in the manga so effective. The same can be said of his art for Frankenstein. The Creature, and moreover the companion Victor creates for him, are horrific. The character designs are signature Ito. Ito takes some liberties with the story, but not enough that it takes away too much from Shelley’s original novel. Purists may be disappointed, however.

Included in this collection are six short stories that center on a high school student named Oshikiri who lives alone in a strange mansion while his parents are away. In “Neck Specter”, he murders his best friend Kojima over petty jealousies and buries him on his family’s land, only to discover that when he unearths him that his neck has grown longer. Soon he is seeing everyone around him growing long, winding necks and accusing him of his crime. “Bog of Living Spirits” tells the tale of a small body of water near Oshikiri’s high school where it is rumored the ghost of a jealous girl drowns handsome boys that wander into the area. In this story, Kojima is alive and followed relentlessly by the high school girls who adore him. When he volunteers to help the other students tidy up the land around the bog, the girls are distraught and beg him not to go. Were they right, especially when they witness him falling in and not resurfacing? Oshikiri becomes friends with a seemingly lonely girl in “Pen Pals”. The young girl begins receiving insults and death threats in letters after she tells them of her new friendship. Oshikiri finds out the disturbing truth when he visits her at home. In “Intruders”, Oshikiri befriends some classmates who are interested in alternate dimensions, and who want to explore his mansion after he describes the strange footsteps he hears. There, they discover their own graves, complete with rotting corpses.

“Hell of the Doll Funeral” is the shortest story in the book, but one of the most gruesome. Children are starting to turn into dolls, and parents burn them before the affliction completes its cycle. One mother refuses to do so, and the result is terrifying.

The last two stories in the book gives the reader an uncommonly light-hearted look into the Ito family, specifically the family dog. The Matlese named Non-Non was clearly the ruler of the family.

While this volume is a departure from works such as the aforementioned Tomie, Uzumaki, and Gyo, it is still very enjoyable. Ito’s art style is unique and highly detailed. I would recommend this title for those who like graphic adaptation of classic horror, body horror, horror manga, and interesting stories.

Contains: blood, body horror, gore, nudity

Highly recommended

Reviewed by Lizzy Walker

Posted on May 27, 2020 by , Reply

Book Review: The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

Gallery/Saga Press

ISBN-13: 978-1982136451

Available: Hardcover, Kindle edition, audiobook, audio CD

 

The past year, for me, has been the year of menacing deer. After encountering the demonically controlled deer that trap unwitting victims in the Pennsylvania woods in Imaginary Friend and the unsettling antelope shapeshifters in The Antelope Wife,  the vengeful, shapeshifting elk out for blood shouldn’t have surprised me.  Stephen Graham Jones has given us his version of  I Know What You Did Last Summer, taking place on reservation land.

Ten years earlier, four stupid kids stampeded a herd of elk meant to be left in peace, and shot as many as they could. One of them was a pregnant mother. Unable to take advantage of the meat of all the elk they had killed, they left their slaughter behind. After the incident, the park ranger banned them from hunting. It’s a horrifying scene to read, and anger-inducing, but who, and how long, pays for sins like these? Is forgiveness even possible?

Two of the boys from that night escape the reservation and are gone for years, but the first evidently doesn’t go far enough– chased by some white guys looking to pick a fight, he encounters an elk that escalates the situation and is brutally killed. The second, Lewis,  returns to the reservation with his wife for the funeral, only to have things escalate as he enters a hallucinatory, murderous state. The remaining two, Gabe and Cassidy, who have stayed on the reservation, decide to hold a sweat in memory of their friend, which turns out to be a poor decision for everyone involved. It is up to Gabe’s teenage daughter, Denorah, to outrun the Elk Head Woman and resolve things.

I had to read this strange, supernatural slasher tale more than once to understand what was going on, but it was totally worth it. The character development is well-done, the unsettling aspect of the supernatural getting more and more entangled into the destruction of these men and their families really sinks in, and the reservation setting and its conflicts felt very real. It is kind of reality-bending to see an animal that I think of as being generally peaceful out for violent revenge. Yet Graham Jones makes it all work. Highly recommended.

 

Contains: violence, gore, murder, body horror.

 

 

Posted on May 5, 2020 by , 2 comments

Graphic Novel Review: Monstress, Volume 4 by Marjorie Liu, illustrated by Sana Takeda

Monstress, Volume 4: The Chosen by Marjorie Liu, illustrated by Sana Takeda

Image Comics, 2019

ISBN-13: 978-1534313361

Available: Paperback, Kindle, comiXology

 

Maika Halfwolf and Corvin D’Oro of the Dusk Court travel in search of the young Arcanic Kippa, who was kidnapped at the end of the third volume. Meanwhile, a forced marriage between the Dawn and Dusk Courts is being conducted, with Maika’s childhood friend Tuya marrying  Moriko Halfwolf’s ruthless twin sister and Maika’s aunt.

During their search, Maika and Corvin are abducted by Yvette Lo Lim and a mysterious man bearing the same eye symbol on his chest as Maika’s,  claiming to be her father. They are members of the newly formed Blood Court, a group led by Maika’s father, who is also known as the Lord Doctor. Maika wakes up in unfamiliar surroundings, with a prosthetic arm the Lord Doctor attached to Maika without Maika’s consent. He and the rest of the Blood Court try to convince Maika to join their cause. The Lord Doctor offers to tell her more about her childhood, as well as about Zinn, the Monstrum sharing Maika’s body, and his experience as Zinn’s former host. However, after learning of his terrible experimentations and the cannibal murders he committed that earned him the nickname “The Ghoul Killer”, she isn’t sure that she wants the answers she has been searching for after all.

Meanwhile, Kippa escapes her captors and discovers some of her own past. Her own Arcanic abilities are emerging. When she jumps into a pit running away from the abductors who are taking her to the Lord Doctor, she comes face to face with creatures that emerge from the shadows. Before they can attack her, a Dracul that resembles a giant three-eyed dragon stops them, recognizing her abilities and has conversation with Kippa about loss, slavery, and of the nature of the Monstrum.

Volume 4 collects issues 19 through 24.

Monstress is one of the few comics where I collect individual issues, and one where I find something new when I have gone back to revisit the series. The story is deep and intriguing, and it is easy to miss something in the first reading. Liu is a great storyteller, and this is one of the most intricate plots in a comic series I have ever read. Takeda’s intricate artwork is gorgeous, with character designs and creatures that are both beautiful and terrifying. There are plenty of reasons why Monstress won multiple Eisner Awards and nominated for this year’s Stoker Award Superior Achievement in a Graphic Novel category.

Contains: forced marriage, sexual content

Highly recommended

Reviewed by Lizzy Walker

Posted on April 18, 2020 by , Reply
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