Graphic Content: Abbott and Abbott 1973

 

Urban fantasy and paranormal romance, including works by Jim Butcher and Patricia Biggs, are two speculative subgenres that often get lumped together. And just like chocolate and peanut butter, they create something better than the sum of their parts. Rather than dissect these stories for the elements that are either urban fantasy or paranormal romance, the meager taken up with this review would be better spent enlightening readers about a pair of graphic novels that are not only a great example of both urban fantasy and paranormal romance but contains some social commentary into which readers can sink their mental teeth. These two graphic novels are Abbott and its sequel Abbott 1973, both written by Saladin Ahmed and illustrated by Sami Kivelä.

Abbott introduces the reader to chain-smoking, tough as nails Elena Abbott, tabloid reporter with an acerbic wit, a need to always be smoking, and a supernatural destiny that piques the interest of the dark forces brewing in Detroit. In Abbott, Elena must battle a secret society with close ties to the Umbra, a literal force of darkness that wants to destroy the world. The first book introduces the reader to Abbott’s world and its colorful characters, some who don’t make it to the end of the first story. In Abbott 1973, after learning more about her destiny and enjoying a new relationship, Elena must find out who or what is trying to interfere in Detroit’s mayoral election. Elena and her friends must battle not only the agents of the Umbra but also the racism and corruption that flow through Detroit’s streets like poison.

Those who like hard-boiled noir, ‘70s cop shows, or urban fantasy will find something to like in Ahmed’s story. Elena features prominently in every panel, always smoking and rarely smiling. Elena might not have a lot to smile about, particularly when it comes to her status in this version of the Motor City. Elena has lost lovers to threats both mundane and paranormal, and she faces racism as well as sexism in her job as a reporter, but these struggles are what make her an interesting character as well as someone to whom modern readers can relate. Kivelä’s artwork helps immerse the reader in Elena’s world, not only by invoking the fashion and aesthetic of the ‘70s but by using an art style that brings to mind early ‘80s Vertigo comics. These books are for fans of The Dresden Files as well as the Mercy Thompson series, but they also display a social awareness in its depictions, for example, of racism among Detroit’s police. This look into deeper, darker issues that aren’t supernatural helps set it apart from the many heroines of this genre that are both witty and tough as nails.

Have You Read This? Andy Davidson's The Boatman's Daughter

Read and find out 
what happened to this guy

Like westerns, fantasy, and science fiction, Southern Gothic fiction uses the environment as another character. Often full of tall grasses that seem to soak up the sweltering heat, lush and massive trees where evil lurks behind and within, and murky marshlands, swimming with hidden dangers, this landscape serves as both the backdrop for the characters’ various misdeeds and its own character, as much alive as the people who plot and murder within its confines. This is the setting of Andy Davidson’s latest book The Boatman’s Daughter, a beautifully fantastic, Southern gothic tale of dark magic and darker stains upon the soul.

The protagonist Miranda Crabtree grew up in the swamps of Arkansas. After losing her father at an early age, she is adopted by a mysterious witch, earning herself an adopted brother, and soon begins working with a cast of shady characters. Miranda’s world is upended when a mysterious girl comes into the swamp. The girl has strange powers, and some bad men want her, men willing to burn down or tear through whatever gets in their way. The girl’s entry into Miranda’s life also upends everything she thought she knew about her life and her makeshift family, even as she strives to defend both.

The Southern gothic tradition boasts such luminaries as Flannery O’Connor and William Faulkner, and even if Andy Davidson’s writing doesn’t transcend the prose of these luminaries, he shows his love for the genre, perhaps even an innate understanding of it, through the prose he writes. The land that he writes about is as textured and thrumming with menacing as the diabolical preacher Billy Cotton and the sadistic constable Charlie Riddle. The book could take place a year ago, five years ago, and even twenty years ago, the setting so alien and separate from what we know that the intrusion from the outside world, the world beyond the swamp, is minimal. Davidson’s prose draws you into this world, as fantastical as anything Frodo walked through, but grounded in a gritty reality familiar to fans of noir and suspense. Readers will marvel at the spectacle of the world Davidson paints even as they watch their steps for water moccasins.

New Arrival: Those Who Came Before by J. H. Moncrieff

There was a time not long ago where detective shows ruled the airwaves. Whether it was the multitude of Law and Orders, everything from the classic to Criminal Intent, or CSI shows in every major city, going back to Starsky and Hutch and even Dragnet, law enforcement has always played well into the heroic archetype. The office in question may be a seasoned veteran who was not too old for this sh** or a fresh-faced rookie eager to prove themselves, but they risked everything to protect the public from the criminals that lurked just outside our vantage point. When involving horror and the supernatural, those evil forces go far beyond masked men or mob bosses in business suits into something truly malevolent, out to maim and murder in the most visceral way possible. J.H. Moncrieff’s newest Those Who Came Before borrows heavily from this hero cop archetype, but also adds its own flourishes that help it stand out from the stories that came before.

Detective Maria Greyeyes has seen a lot of disturbing things in her tenure as a homicide detective, but her most disturbing comes with the gory remains at the Strong Lake Campground where three campers met their grisly end and Reese Wallace, the only camper to survive, claims to have no memory of what happened. Those familiar with the cop archetype are familiar with the strain the job places on her marriage and family, but the case also tests the limits of her sanity, especially as whatever supernatural forces in that campground comes after Sarah. Just like Law and Order, this story benefits from multiple perspectives. Greyeyes is chasing down leads even as those leads take her into darker places while Reese is trying to come to terms with his own survivor’s guilt and basically being the only suspect in the case.

Along with multiple viewpoints, the novel gives us a narrative that borrows from historical fiction and perhaps showcases an overarching theme to the story. Along with the present day mystery narrative, the book goes into the past to show how a meeting between the indigenous people and white settlers has left a stain of evil upon this land. This narrative clearly depicts many of the settlers as the villains (with some historical accuracy), but the acts done by the natives in retaliation are what curses the campground for generations. Readers see how this evil created by blind hatred and revenge still permeates enough to be felt by Maria and Reese, even influencing their actions in the present. In many books about cursed places, much like this one, there is the theme of not necessarily evil spirits staining a place but evil acts that live beyond the people that perpetrated them. Maria in particular has the power to break the cycle, but readers will have to read the book to find out if she can.

Ultimately, this tale is a blend of different genres that, far from being a haphazard mishmash, tells an intriguing story about the permanence of evil and our need to be vigilant against it. Fans of mysteries, of historical fiction, of Native American mysticism, and of visceral horror will find this book has many different ways to sink its claws into them.

Screen to Scream: Brightburn and Irredeemable

Fans of Spider-Man may remember the advice his Uncle Ben gave the hero that shaped his crime-fighting career: With great power comes great responsibility. However, that philosophy often runs headlong into the old adage “Power corrupts . . . .” From our current political climate to the headlines plastered with authority figures falling from grace, we are all too familiar with the effects of power without responsibility. It’s then surprising that the genre superhero horror Brightburn or a similar idea took this long to see daylight. Many films like Hellboy and Swamp Thing have combined superheroics with the supernatural, but the film does explore a very frightening idea inherent in people with amazing powers who are suddenly tired of us.

Elseworld stories, featuring alternate takes on DC superheroes, has explored what would happen to Superman if he were raised somewhere else (communist Russia, for example). Brightburn, though, gets everything about the Superman mythos (the crash landing in Kansas, the discovery by parents willing to raise the discovered child as their own) and takes it to a much darker place. In the beginning of the movie, Brandon Breyer, the strange visitor from another planet, seems like a sweet-if-awkward boy turning 12. Not only is he going through puberty, but the ship that delivered him here, the ship he previously knew nothing about, is speaking to him in an alien language, basically telling him to conquer our world. Soon, what could once be attributed to teenage hormones devolves into full-blown sociopathic behavior as Brandon realizes there is nothing anyone could do to stop him from living out his brutal, blood-soaked fantasies. It’s a frightening idea, a Superman becoming not just evil, but one willing to use his abilities on the all-too-fragile human anatomy, but Brightburn is not the only story, or even the best one, that explores this idea.

Irredeemable features Superman-gone-bad the Plutonian and puts him in a world that has superheroes, but those heroes the Plutonian once fought alongside are still powerless to stop him. The Plutonian is also just as violent as Brandon, immolating people down to their skeletons with his heat vision, but he has also committed the wholesale destruction of cities and even nations, simply to lash out at a world that he believes has fundamentally wronged him. While it seems that Brightburn’s evil hero needed an alien spaceship to convince him to fully embrace his inner Armageddon bringer, Waid’s depiction of Plutonian is more nuanced, showing a hero who began his life in and out of foster homes, his foster parents rejecting him because they feared his abilities. Finally gaining the acceptance he long sought as a superhero, when people began to doubt him after a catastrophic mistake, he fully rejects them as he feels that he has been rejected, ultimately deciding to be the villain of a world that refuses to see him as a hero. Filling this world full of fully realized heroes and characters that would fit in either Marvel or DC’s superhero worlds, Waid presents a character study in the Plutonian of one both blessed and burdened by power, a true alien who can’t, despite his immense power, find what he really wants: to belong.

Fearsome Five: Five Scariest Batman Villains

Batman, the Caped Crusader, the Dark Knight, is celebrating his 80^th anniversary this week. Sure, John Constantine battles demons regularly and Swamp Thing is as his name implies, a thing that lives out in the swamp, but Batman comics have always seemed horror adjacent, and not simply because he chooses to dress like what Dracula turns into when he wants to fly. Sure, Batman is obsessive about avenging the death of his parents to the detriment of any lasting relationships with people who aren’t part of his crusade, but look at Batman’s villains. To name all of Batman’s villains that could be in a horror movie would be to list most of his rogues’ gallery, but here are his five scariest.

5) Scarecrow—Dr. Jonathan Crane has devoted his life to the study of fear, what it is and also how to cause it. He usually employs fear toxins which forces people to hallucinate their own worst nightmares. The idea of losing control is scary, particularly for someone like Batman who likes to be in control, but how do you regain control when the reality around you is suspect? Everything from the comics to the Batman: The Animated Series (TAS) has played with these hallucinations and what they do to Batman each time he is unlucky enough to get a dose of Scarecrow’s toxin.

Also, keep in mind that Scarecrow, who literally studies fear, is number 5.

4) Professor Pyg—Fans of body horror may find something intriguing or disturbing in Professor Pyg’s modus operandi. No, he doesn’t seek to free his porcine brethren before they are slaughtered, nor is he a huge fan of mud. Professor Pyg is a surgeon and what he remakes are innocent people. He remakes them through surgery and torture into Dollotrons, mindless automatons who Pyg believes are perfect. While he does snort and does wear a pig mask, Pyg’s exploits are terrifying because he sees imperfection everywhere and will not stop until he remakes the world into his own idea of perfection. Fans of the Arkham series of video games might remember the Pyg mission where Batman must track down people who are kidnapped and surgically altered by Pyg. A pretty recent character, having been created by Grant Morrison in the 2000’s, animated television never delved too much into the surgery aspect of Pyg’s character, possibly not knowing how to deal with what exactly happens to his Dollotrons once Pyg is captured.

3) Clayface—There are many men who have taken the moniker (and there was even a female version who called herself Lady Clay), but many focus on two aspects/powers of the characters: the ability to shapeshift and the ability to melt flesh with physical contact. Another aspect that seems constant is the Phantom of the Opera trope used to give these characters tragic backstories as monsters who must live apart from humanity. Alan Moore’s story of Clayface Preston Payne, who could dissolve flesh, plays into this when this Clayface discovers the love of his life, a mannequin immune to his touch, but creates a character that is dangerously unstable and unquestioningly sympathetic as he tries to figure out his relationship with Helena as Batman tries to recapture him.

The animated series gave us Matt Hagen gave us a shapeshifting Clayface whose backstory mimics the infamous Phantom, an actor who has become disfigured is given a chance to resurrect his career with a chemical that lets him change his face, but an overdose of the chemical, thanks to some criminals shaking him down, mutates him into his current Clayface form.

Some might say that he could simply pick a shape, that he doesn’t have to be a monster, but Clayface, in his introductory TAS episode “Feat of Clay,” explains tragically why that can’t work. Hagen explains that his shapeshifting is “like tensing a muscle,” meaning he has to concentrate to maintain a form that isn’t his clay one. Matt Hagen can walk among people, but it’s only for a short while. No matter who or what he becomes, he must still live with the knowledge constantly of what image will be waiting for him in the mirror.

2) The Joker—Arguably Batman’s most famous villain, comics like Death of the Family and The Killing Joke have played up the dichotomy that Batman and the Joker have shared. Batman, a man who studies friends and foes alike, creating multiple dossiers on them, has very little information on the Joker. Even the Joker himself, according to The Killing Joke, says that he has trouble remembering his own past. The uncertainty factor is there, meaning the Dark Knight cannot always see his nemesis’s motivations, sometimes only arriving after Joker’s horrific acts, and the Joker has had more than a few. From paralyzing Batgirl to beating Robin to death with a crowbar to cutting off his own face, the Joker never runs out of ways to disturb Batman and the audience. In fact, the only really clear motivation for Joker’s crimes seems to be to get the Batman’s attention. He sees himself as Batman’s greatest rival and that ultimately gives the Joker purpose, and he has no qualms about how he gets Batman’s attention. Joker has ended up the ultimate test of Batman’s No Killing rule because of this. Imagine Batman knowing that the Joker’s horrific acts are committed basically to get the Dark Knight’s attention and continue their eternal struggle.

1) The Batman Who Laughs—From the pages of Dark Knights Metal comes what would happen if Batman actually gave in and murdered the Joker. This alternate Batman is from a dark multiverse where Batman finally kills the Joker, releasing a chemical that infects Batman. Similar to Joker’s Joker Venom, this chemical not only gives Batman the same skin condition, but also renders him brutally insane, a perfect amalgam of hero and villain, who then goes on to kill every one of his universe’s heroes. The Batman Who Laughs is scary because he keeps a crew of feral Jokerized Robins chained at his side. He even has a history of killing superheroes throughout multiverses, but there’s also Batman’s analytical mind irrevocably twisted to evil that makes the Batman Who Laughs truly terrifying. Batman is all about control, everything from his metahuman battle strategies to his No Killing Rule reflects this. The Batman Who Laughs is basically Batman, with his knowledge and skills on how to take down virtually anyone of any power set, with no control, no moral backstop. He is basically a combination of the two most dangerous aspects of Batman and the Joker and a literal nightmare for our world’s Bruce Wayne.