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‘Outlast’ Comic Issue 1 Review: Meet the Pauls

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Video games have given us enough frighteningly awful corporations over the years that we can actually measure how evil they are by determining its place on the spectrum. A Spectrum of Evil, if you will. If you’re trying to form a picture of what that might look like in your mind’s eye, I like to imagine an aggressively hateful rainbow. Scattered about this spectrum, we have an assortment of fictional corporate entities that were — or continue to be — total jerks.

Among these faceless international conglomerates run by morally bankrupt people-shaped monsters is the mischievous Murkoff Corporation and its obviously evil, teeth-shaped logo. It’s the reason why Outlast plays like a found footage reimagining of Condemned when it could’ve easily been a somewhat spooky Stanley Parable.

Murkoff is responsible for the atrocities this series exposes us to — except, maybe, for that one inmate we meet in the original game as he shamelessly, uh, displays his affection for corpses. I have a feeling that guy was broken long before he ended up at Mount Massive Asylum.

Now, Murkoff isn’t the worst name you’d find listed on the Spectrum of Evil, but it is pretty bad. Disguised as a charity organization, the company secretly experimented on patients, empowering some while killing others, and effectively treated its employees like prisoners. It’s no Umbrella Corporation or Horzine Biotech, but Murkoff’s sinister deeds are comparable to Armacham from the F.E.A.R. series, which also covertly experimented on scores of people, albeit for different reasons.

Still, where series like Resident Evil, Dead Rising and F.E.A.R. have had at least a decade to show us the inner workings of the organization behind much of the bad stuff that happens in the games, Outlast debuted in 2013. We know the Murkoff Corporation is wicked, because we’ve seen what they’re willing to do, the lives they’re willing — eager, even — to sacrifice, and the ultimate result of their vile acts.

Other than that, the company is largely a mystery.

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That’s where the new five issue comic Outlast: The Murkoff Account comes in, to finally acquaint us with the real, and surprisingly vicious, Murkoff Corporation. It accomplishes this, in addition to bridging the gap between the first game and the upcoming sequel, by focusing on Paul Marion and Pauline Glick, aka “The Pauls.” What makes this duo special is their shared occupation as two agents of the Murkoff Insurance Mitigation Department (MIMD).

What that department does is fairly self-explanatory, but its role is to respond to incidents before they’re made public with the goal of minimizing the economic fallout. As Pauline explains to a frightened psychotherapist in the first issue, “We’re not here to save anybody.”

It makes perfect sense that Outlast would approach the issue of needing to expand upon the world they introduced us to three years ago with a “bridge episode” comic that doesn’t only star two corporate-trained sociopaths, but pairs their startling coldness with an art style by The Black Frog that employs a very minimal use of color.

Each monochromatic page has a dreary, washed out look to it, like the story was sketched on old newspaper. It’s conservative with its use of color, but the result is effective, as it forces the few colors — a bright yellow tie, crimson pools of blood — it does use to immediately stand out.

Much like the game it’s based on, in which bouts of exploration are broken up by frantic chases through the labyrinthine, blood-smattered corridors of Mount Massive, The Murkoff Account is paced in such a way that it goes from zero to sixty quickly and often with very little warning. It’s unsurprising, since Red Barrels enlisted Outlast writer J.T. Petty to handle the comic adaptation.

The comic never reaches the level of intensity as its source material — how could it? — but its first issue has more than enough meat to it to maintain interest as Petty and Co. gradually immerse you in a brand new story that promises to be just as creepy and unnerving as the games that inspired it. Fans of Outlast absolutely need to check this out. If that includes you, then you can sign up here to learn more about it.

In related news, I recently spent some time with the demo for Outlast 2, the playthrough of which you can find below for your viewing pleasure. It hits PC, PS4 and Xbox One this fall.

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Gamer, writer, terrible dancer, longtime toast enthusiast. Legend has it Adam was born with a controller in one hand and the Kraken's left eye in the other. Legends are often wrong.

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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