Hellboy and the B.P.R.D.: The Secret of Chesbro House and Others

The last time we got an anthology of stories featuring the Big Red Guy, it was the excellent “The Return of Effie Kolb.”  That collection showed that creator Mike Mignola is still the best there is at telling stories within his own fictional universe with the worst of the stories there better described as just the “least good.”  “The Secret of Chesbro House” isn’t quite on the same level, but it’s still another strong showing from Mignola, even if he didn’t write everything by himself here.

Something which is seen in the very first story, “Night of the Cyclops,” which he co-wrote with French artist Oliver Vatine, who also illustrated it.  It’s April 1962 and Hellboy has just apprehended a rampaging and unrepentant minotaur, but he’s not headed back to the B.P.R.D.  Instead he heads off into the undergrowth following a strange goat who leads him to a hidden enclave of humanoid goat people.  They were cursed by Aphrodite to take these forms, and because the goddess was extra spiteful, she also had a cyclops come around every year to wreck their home.  Guess who’s been recruited to stop the monster now.

This is all standard “Hellboy” fare, but still well-executed for what it is.  Big Red’s non-plussedness with the local customs is fun as is the gusto he goes at the titular monster with.  Vatine’s art is perfectly fine, more concerned with composition rather than detail.  Still, he manages to sell the big stuff like the fighting and the stuff involving the gods quite well.

Next is the title story of this collection, co-written with Christopher Golden and illustrated by Shawn McManus.  Because Trevor Bruttenholm danced with a woman at a fancy gathering during the war, Hellboy finds himself involved in a seance orchestrated by her son to break the curse on his family home.  Basically another Tuesday for him.  The catch being that the curse attached to this house was orchestrated by a bad, bad man and the evil he summoned into this world isn’t going to be easily dispatched.

“The Secret of Chesbro House” is unique in that it’s a straight-up haunted house story.  While those are a dime a dozen in fiction, I believe that this is the first time we’ve seen Hellboy tackle one himself.  It’s got the works with banging doors, ghostly howls, actual ghosts out to claim the living, and something unspeakable in the basement.  All this gives McManus the freedom he needs to have fun with it all, and it looks great as a result.  Mignola and Golden are also clearly enjoying themselves indulging in some conventions like the creepy caretaker, while delivering a darker than expected history for the haunting itself.  It’s easy to see why the volume is named after this story.

“Old Man Whittier” is a follow-up to a story that I don’t really remember, and this one involves a member of that family accompanying Hellboy back to her family’s home.  Bad St. Patrick-related stuff subsequently occurs.  This isn’t an essential read in the Mignolaverse canon by any stretch but it’s graced with wonderfully moody and detailed art from Gabriel Hernandez Walta.  Also, the lady and Hellboy’s reactions to the supernatural threat’s real form are priceless bits of on-the-nose humor.

The final two stories, “The Miser’s Gift” and “Time is a River,” are both linked and written by Mignola with art from Mark Laszlow.  In the first, Hellboy is in Budapest and gets involved with an eccentric former professor with detailed knowledge of the city’s supernatural history.  Said professor is helping a young man who helped an old ghost and was rewarded with a nightmare-inducing coin for his troubles.  While that story ends well for most everyone involved, the follow-up is there to address the fate of the one person for whom it didn’t.

Both stories are great showcases for Laszlow who has an exaggerated style that borders on surrealism without ever quite crossing over.  It enhances the rather ordinary first story, as that feels like Mignola is just re-writing a classic tale.  The second is more memorable due to how weird it gets, to the point of leaving story logic behind at the end.  That’s not as big an issue as it seems since it gives the artist a chance to go really gonzo with the supernatural imagery here.

Mignola-written “Hellboy” anthologies are, at this point, one of the safest bets in the industry.  He, and his co-writers and artists have been doing this for years, yet they still deliver memorable weirdness time in and time out.  It may not be as good as the one that preceded it, but it’s a good value for your money, especially when compared to…