Comics
Preview: Frankenstein Alive, Alive! #1
Horror icons Steve Niles and Bernie Wrightson are continuing Mary Shelley’s monster masterpiece, Frankenstein (or The Modern Prometheus). Character continuations always give rise to skepticism (Before Watchmen), especially when they take on such prolific characters. However, Frankenstein Alive, Alive! looks to honor the character and his legend, rather than tear it apart. Wrightson illustrated the original Shelley story in 1983, and it’s been considered one of the best illustrated works in horror since. Looking at the preview, you’ll see that the artwork alone makes this book worth the cover price.
WRITTEN BY: Steve Niles
ART BY: Bernie Wrightson
PUBILSHER: IDW
PRICE: $3.99
RELEASE: May 9
Few works by comic-book artists have earned the universal acclaim and reverence that Bernie Wrightson’s illustrated version of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s Frankenstein was met with upon its original release in 1983.
Nearly 30 years later, Wrightson returns to his passion project with a comic series that picks up at the end of the classic novel, hailed as one of the greatest horror stories of all time. Frequent Wrightson collaborator Steve Niles provides the script for this epic, decades in the making.
While appearing to be in black and white, each page was scanned in color to mimic as closely as possible the experience of viewing the actual original art, showing off the exquisitely detailed brush work of one of the greatest living artists in comics today.
Each issue will also include supplemental materials, including interviews, essays and a serialization of the original prose story by Shelley.
IDW Dark and Paramount recently joined forces to launch limited comic book tales set in the worlds of Smile and A Quiet Place, and we’ve learned today that they’ll continue hanging around in those franchise universes with two brand new limited series tales.
Entertainment Weekly has exclusively revealed this afternoon that IDW Dark’s Any Given Smile debuts in September, while A Quiet Place: Rising Tides arrives in November.
First up, from writer Stephanie Williams and artist Pablo Collar, Any Given Smile puts a football-themed twist on Parker Finn’s successful Smile movie franchise.
The five-part limited series is “set in January 1995, during the American Arena League football championship game in St. Augustine, Florida. The rising superstar of the Sharks, backup quarterback Dupree, is feeling the pressure from his teammates, the fans, and also the city’s gambling underworld, to whom he owes a considerable debt. Meanwhile, a sports journalist investigates a string of suicides that may be connected to the big game. At the very least, they are connected to a sinister entity that preys on the minds of its victims.”
From writer Declan Shalvey and artist Luke Sparrow, A Quiet Place: Rising Tides will also be a five-issue limited story. The comic book tale “brings the creatures to the Florida Keys, where a father-daughter duo attempt to survive on water in a houseboat.”
EW further details, “This tense family reunion coincides with the arrival of the vicious creatures that hunt through sound. Grace and her dad find safety on the open ocean, but she’ll have to make landfall sooner or later; the father’s oxygen tank and their supplies are running low, while a hurricane swiftly approaches.”
Learn more about both comic books over on Entertainment Weekly.
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