Dark Horse Penguin Picks: February 2023
Above-the-Board Recommendation:
Where Monsters Lie #1 (of 4)
Kyle Starks may not be the most high-profile writer debuting his first Dark Horse title in these solicitations, but he has the one I’m most looking forward to reading. The writer is teaming with talented artist Piotr Kowalski for this series about what slasher-movie monsters get up to when they’re not embarking on their periodic killing sprees. It turns out that they spend their time at Wilmhurst, a gated community in the middle of nowhere, doing their best to try and relax until they get the chance to go out and kill again. While the idea of a miniseries exploring what these monsters get up to on their downtime sounds fun, Starks has thrown in an extra twist about a survivor of some of these rampages who knows where they live and is about to enact his plan to get a little payback. Starks is no stranger to dark humor, and it looks like he and Kowalski will be bumping up against actual horror for this story. It all sounds entertaining, in a disturbing kind of way, and I look forward to seeing if they can pull it off.
Free Comic Book Day 2023: The Umbrella Academy & The Witcher: Dark Horse puts two of its most high-profile titles (which both coincidentally have live-action series on Netflix) together for this one-shot. While I haven’t read any of the publishers “Witcher” comics, the fact that we’re getting a new “Umbrella Academy” story from original creators Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba is the big news here. I mean, the hope here is that this is just the warm-up for a forthcoming fourth volume of the series. I kind of doubt that it is, but I’d sure like to be wrong.
Masters of the Universe: Masterverse #1 (of 4): “Masters of the Universe” gets the multiverse treatment as the Sorceress tries to save the life of her champion. It’s been… a few decades since I was invested in this property at all, but there’s something surprising being offered in this first issue. That would be a story illustrated by none other than Sergio Aragones. It’s rare that the legendary creator of “Groo” has illustrated anything other than his signature title, and rarer still to see him working without writer Mark Evanier. “Revival’s” Tim Seely is writing this miniseries and Kelly Jones provides the art for the other story in this issue. I’ll admit that Aragones’ presence does make me want to check this out, but I still have to get over my current indifference towards He-Man and company for that to happen. Maybe this miniseries will have similarly impressive artists in subsequent issues to convince me… I mean, I like Kelly Jones, but this isn’t so far out of his wheelhouse to impress me in the same way that seeing Aragones’ here does.
Blue Book #1 (of 5): James Tynion IV makes his debut at Dark Horse with this nonfiction series about UFO abductions. You read that right, “nonfiction series about UFO abductions.” The plan here is to capture the strangeness and mystery of these initial reports, starting with the Betty and Barney Hill abduction that catapulted the idea into the public consciousness. Tynion is teaming with artist Michael Avon Oeming for this miniseries and if you remember the issues of “Powers” that dealt with alien abductions, then you know he’s the right man for this job. While my opinion of Tynion has certainly increased over the past year, I can’t say that it’s done so to the point where I can be fully excited about a project like this. Call me “cautiously optimistic” thanks to Oeming’s involvement.
Space Job #1 (of 4): David Goodman, who has worked on “The Orville” and written comics based on it for Dark Horse, gives us an original concept for this series with artist Alvaro Sarraseca. Well, “original” in the sense that it appears to be what if “The Office” took place on a Federation Starship. It’s not something that’s been done before; though, I imagine your appreciation for “The Orville” and Goodman’s previous comics work will likely influence how excited you should be for this miniseries.
Murky World HC: A warrior wakes up to find himself in a strange land populated by zombies, necromancers, big-breasted cyclops, cults and more. Fortunately he has his trusty steed Frix at his side as he tries to deal with all of this strangeness. This comes to us from the late, great Richard Corben whose extensive work in the comics medium appears to be getting the same treatment the publisher has given to Jean “Moebius” Girard. That’s what I’m inferring from the “first in a series of deluxe graphic novels from renowned creator Richard Corben’s library to be published by Dark Horse Comics” line in the solicitation text. The man is certainly deserving of this treatment, as anyone who has seen his immediately identifiable work can tell you. Which is what Mike Mignola will be doing in his introduction.
Frankenstein: New World HC: What happens after the end of the world? That’s what creators Mike Mignola, Christopher Golden and Tom Sniegoski, along with artist Peter Bergting are here to tell you. While some humans survived Ragna Rok, they were only able to do so by retreating inside the hollow earth. Now, a young girl named Lija is having visions of a new evil taking root on the surface of the Earth. While her elders want nothing to do with it, Lija is determined to find out what’s going on. Fortunately, she’s got Frankenstein on her side to help. Normally I’d be excited about anything that looks to make the end of “B.P.R.D.: The Devil You Know” more interesting. I’ll still pick this up, though I’ll admit my enthusiasm has been muted by the decision to put most forthcoming Mignolaverse stories in hardcover for $5 more. While we’re on the subject…
Maskerade HC: Kevin Smith’s first miniseries, with co-writer Andy McElfresh and artist John Sprengelmeyer, from his imprint at Dark Horse gets collected in a hardcover format. I don’t know what about this warranted such treatment, but there you go. This miniseries hasn’t really generated a lot of buzz and would therefore seem to appeal only to Smith’s most devoted fans. It’s been a while since I could call myself one of those, but I’ll likely get around to checking out “Clerks III” before I give this a shot. I’m just not interested in paying the hardcover tax on this one.
Fortune & Glory: One of Bendis’ best comics gets a new edition through Dark Horse. In case you’re not familiar with it, this is the story of the creator’s first trip through Hollywood after his graphic novels “Goldfish,” and then “Torso,” get some buzz. The results are as entertaining as they are illuminating about the creative process in Tinseltown. I’m glad that Bendis is dedicated to keeping this in print as he moves his library from publisher to publisher, as this is another one of his comics that deserves a spot in everyone’s library.
Grendel Omnibus vol. 4: Prime: Matt Wagner’s longest-running comics series mutates again as the face of Grendel becomes something that more resembles “The Terminator” than Hunter Rose. Not that this is a bad thing, as anyone who reads the Eisner-winning “War Child” maxiseries will see here. It’s just that anyone who got caught up in the globe-conquering saga of Orion Assante is going to find a completely different, yet compulsively readable, story waiting for them here.
Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! Vol. 5: Just wanted to point out that this is the most recent volume Dark Horse has announced as being licensed by them. There are still two more volumes in Japan that have yet to be released over here, so let’s hope that they’ll be picked up and released here in short order. By that I mean, go out and buy this volume when it’s released so the publisher will know that there’s an audience for this series!
Gantz Omnibus vol. 12: Given that this series didn’t have a total number of volumes divisible by three, I was wondering how Dark Horse would handle the release of the final volumes. My guess was that they’d deliver a pair of two-volume omnibi in lieu of the three-volume omnibi they had been releasing up to this point. Fortunately for anyone picking the series up in this format, that’s not what they did here. Vol. 12 is a four-in-one collection wrapping up their release of this series.