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2012 BLACK FRIDAY CHOPPING LIST: BOOKS & COMICS!

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Yep! It’s that time of year again. Thanksgiving is on Thursday, which means dutiful consumers are already preparing for the Holiday Shopping Season. If you think you’re exempt from that, think again. Either you know a fellow horror fan (or family member) in need, or you want something for yourself! You can take this as advice for what to buy, or what to ask for.

This fourth installment is all about books and comics…lots of comics! We’ve got a few behind-the-scenes looks at some of your favorite movies, some novels, and some collector’s editions for you to check out as well. A huge thank you to BD Comics guru Lonnie Nadler who shot me some great suggestions! His blurbs are credited as “LN”.

MUSIC / FILMS & TV / GAMES, TOYS & MERCH

Head inside to find that special something for that special someone. Again, I’ve made the images thumbnails so you can scroll more easily through the list – click to make big.

The Cabin In The Woods: Official Visual Companion – Joss Whedon/Drew Goddard

List Price: $19.95 Order Here.

Fans of The Cabin In The Woods tend to be inquisitive types, they want to know more. This book is the perfect gift for them seeing as it contains the film’s screenplay along with a healthy host of detail specific images from and relating to the film.

The Walking Dead: Compendium Two – Image Comics

List Price: $59.99 Order Here.

Collects issues #49–96 of Robert Kirkman’s hit comic The Walking Dead. It’s an absolutely massive book that’s over 1000 pages of zombie drama goodness.” – LN

Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History Of Friday The 13th – Enhanced Edition E-Book – Peter M. Bracke

List Price: $13.00 Order Here.

I know I included the hardcover edition of this on the list last year, but this ebook version was recently released. What’s the difference? For starters, the electronic version contains a TON of video interviews. What else is in here that wasn’t in the original printed work? Additional storyboards, call-sheets, soundtrack snippets, trailers and more. Taking up 1.2GB of space, this thing is MASSIVE.

Sandman Slipcase Set – Neil Gaiman – Vertigo Comics

List Price: $199.99 Order Here.

All ten trades of Neil Gaiman’s inimitable horror series is collected in a special edition slipcase set from Vertigo Comics. Whether you’re into comics or not, this is a series that every horror fan should read. With the approaching prequel series coming out next year, Sandman Zero, this is bound to be a hot item this year. All books are the newest softcover printings.” – LN

Fatale Vol. 1 and 2 – Image Comics

List Price: $14.99 Order Here.

It was only a matter of time before someone combined the classic crime genre with horror. Ed Brubaker, one of comics best crime writers, dives into a world of lies, deceit, murder, and monsters. The story spans across decades, and weaves a wonderfully dark tale of mystery with one of the most alluringly dangerous femme fatale’s you could imagine.” – LN

I, Vampire Vol. 1: Tainted Love – DC Comics

List Price: $14.99 Order Here.

I, Vampire has been flying under the radar for far too long. It takes vampires back to their roots, from a writer who knows bloodsuckers like nobody else. Damned vampire romance, vampire armies, Batman, and enough plot twists to make your nipples hurt, I, Vampire is a must read. ” – LN

Chew Volume 5: Major League Chew – John Layman & Rob Guillory

List Price: $12.99 Order Here.

If you took our advice last year and bought “Volume 4”, chances are you’re going to want to pick this guy up (unless, of course, you already have).

The Complete History of the Return of the Living Dead – Christian Sellers and Gary Smart

List Price: $24.95 Order Here.
This was on the list last year, but was a relatively new release and it’s hard to overstate what a joy it is. Prepare ahead though! The ship time is slow! If you want it by the end of December you gotta act soon.

Mars Attacks Mystery Box Set – IDW Limited

List Price: $99.99 (limited quantities) Order Here.

Ack! Ack! IDW Limited has put together a sweet box set for you Martian lovers. The box set offers up graded comics, trade paperbacks, and variant covers from both the ne and classic Mars Attacks comic series. The books all come packaged and graded. ” -LN

Locke & Key: Welcome to Lovecraft Special Edition – Joe Hill & Gabriel Rodriguez

List Price: $100.00 (limited quantities) Order Here.

Joe Hill’s Locke & Key is one of the most original and gripping horror stories I’ve ever had the pleasure of coming across, in any medium. IDW Limited has put together a wicked oversized edition of volume 1 so you can fully enjoy Gabriel Rodriguez’s art. The Special Edition also contains Joe Hill’s complete scripts.” – LN

Feral – Matt Serafini

List Price: $12.95 Order Here.

To my great chagrin, I haven’t had a chance to read this yet. But it comes highly recommended by several trusted sources and, if you like werewolves, is an indie book well worth supporting.

Animal Man Vol. 1 and Swamp Thing Vol. 1 – DC Comics

List Price: $14.99 Each Order Here and Here.

I put these two together because if you like one, you’ll like the other. The books also run along the same timeline, ultimately colliding in a massive crossover in later issues. Animal Man may sound like a lame hero, but this book from Jeff Lemire combines the horror and super hero genres like nothing else in modern comics. Scott Snyder’s Swamp Thing on the other hand is a grotesque page-turner, packed with stellar art.” – LN

Severed – Image Comics

List Price: $24.99 Order Here.

If you’re looking for a straight up creepy-as-hell horror story, Scott Snyder and Scott Tuft’s Severed might be just what you need under the tree. It’s hard to make horror comics scary, but this one will make your skin crawl. Loosely based on the killings of Albert Fish, Served is a tale of growing up and the dangers of the outside world. If only all horror comics were this good. ” – LN

Comics

[Review] Graphic Novel ‘Tender’ Is Brilliant Feminist Body Horror That Will Make You Squirm & Scream

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Tender Beth Hetland Graphic Novel

Beth Hetland’s debut graphic novel, ‘Tender,’ is a modern tale of love, validation, and self-destruction by way of brutal body horror with a feminist edge.

“I’ve wanted this more than anything.”

Men so often dominate the body horror subgenre, which makes it so rare and insightful whenever women tackle this space. This makes Beth Hetland’s Tender such a refreshing change of pace. It’s earnest, honest, and impossibly exposed. Tender takes the body horror subgenre and brilliantly and subversively mixes it together with a narrative that’s steeped in the societal expectations that women face on a daily basis, whether it comes to empowerment, family, or sexuality. It single-handedly beats other 2023 and ‘24 feminine horror texts like American Horror Story: Delicate, Sick, Lisa Frankenstein, and Immaculate at their own game.

Hetland’s Tender is American Psycho meets Rosemary’s Baby meets Swallow. It’s also absolutely not for the faint of heart.

Right from the jump, Tender grabs hold of its audience and doesn’t let go. Carolanne’s quest for romantic fulfillment, validation, and a grander purpose is easy to empathize with and an effective framework for this woeful saga. Carolanne’s wounds cut so deep simply because they’re so incredibly commonplace. Everybody wants to feel wanted.

Tender is full of beautiful, gross, expressive artwork that makes the reader squirm in their seat and itch. Hetland’s drawings are simultaneously minimalist and comprehensively layered. They’re  reminiscent of Charles Burns’ Black Hole, in the best way possible. There’s consistently inspired and striking use of spot coloring that elevates Hetland’s story whenever it’s incorporated, invading Tender’s muted world.

Hetland employs effective, economical storytelling that makes clever use of panels and scene construction so that Tender can breeze through exposition and get to the story’s gooey, aching heart. There’s an excellent page that depicts Carolanne’s menial domestic tasks where the repetitive panels grow increasingly smaller to illustrate the formulaic rut that her life has become. It’s magical. Tender is full of creative devices like this that further let the reader into Carolanne’s mind without ever getting clunky or explicit on the matter. The graphic novel is bookended with a simple moment that shifts from sweet to suffocating.

Tender gives the audience a proper sense of who Carolanne is right away. Hetland adeptly defines her protagonist so that readers are immediately on her side, praying that she gets her “happily ever after,” and makes it out of this sick story alive…And then they’re rapidly wishing for the opposite and utterly aghast over this chameleon. There’s also some creative experimentation with non-linear storytelling that gets to the root of Carolanne and continually recontextualizes who she is and what she wants out of life so that the audience is kept on guard.

Tender casually transforms from a picture-perfect rom-com, right down to the visual style, into a haunting horror story. There’s such a natural quality to how Tender presents the melancholy manner in which a relationship — and life — can decay. Once the horror elements hit, they hit hard, like a jackhammer, and don’t relent. It’s hard not to wince and grimace through Tender’s terrifying images. They’re reminiscent of the nightmarish dadaist visuals from The Ring’s cursed videotape, distilled to blunt comic panels that the reader is forced to confront and digest, rather than something that simply flickers through their mind and is gone a moment later. Tender makes its audience marinate in its mania and incubates its horror as if it’s a gestating fetus in their womb.

Tender tells a powerful, emotional, disturbing story, but its secret weapon may be its sublime pacing. Hetland paces Tender in such an exceptional manner, so that it takes its time, sneaks up on the reader, and gets under their skin until they’re dreading where the story will go next. Tender pushes the audience right up to the edge so that they’re practically begging that Carolanne won’t do the things that she does, yet the other shoe always drops in the most devastating manner. Audiences will read Tender with clenched fists that make it a struggle to turn each page, although they won’t be able to stop. Tender isn’t a short story, at more than 160 pages, but readers will want to take their time and relish each page so that this macabre story lasts for as long as possible before it cascades to its tragic conclusion. 

Tender is an accomplished and uncomfortable debut graphic novel from Hetland that reveals a strong, unflinching voice that’s the perfect fit for horror. Tender indulges in heightened flights of fancy and toes the line with the supernatural. However, Tender is so successful at what it does because it’s so grounded in reality and presents a horror story that’s all too common in society. It’s a heartbreaking meditation on loneliness and codependency that’s one of 2024’s must-read horror graphic novels.

‘Tender,’ by Beth Hetland and published by Fantagraphics, is now available.

4 out of 5 skulls

Tender graphic novel review

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