A child is in danger. The narrative shifts. What’s real and what’s not in Parasomnia #1, written by Cullen Bunn, drawn and colored by Andrea Mutti for Dark Horse Comics.
Just as Vanessa was getting out of a relationship that went south on account of cheating, a fucktruck full of monsters shows up. Great. Beyond the Breach #1 is written by Ed Brisson, drawn by Damian Couceiro, colored by Patricio Delpche and lettered by Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou for AfterShock.
Bunny Mask #2? Yeah, that’s just straight up weird. But charming. And sexy. Written by Paul Tobin, drawn and colored by Andrea Mutti, and lettered by Taylor Esposito for AfterShock.
Will Nevin: Justin, I feel like an old house with bad plumbing and big dumps: We’re all backed up, and it’s starting to smell around here. Or maybe that’s just me.
Justin Partridge: I smell it too. It smells like … VICTORY.
Yes, my fellow horror-hounds, it’s the shoggoth in the room. We have been absent in the past few weeks, allowing our little patch of the drive-in to grow a touch dusty. But we haven’t been idle! Far from it! The keener edge of our absence has been the chance to catch up on our current in-rotation horror yarns. Some were better than others, but the work and horror never sleep for us here at the CXF Grindhouse.
Like any good ghost, just because you can’t see it, it doesn’t mean it’s not there, ready to appear … RIGHT THERE! NEXT TO YOU! HA! Naw, I’m just kidding, we aren’t right next to you.
We’re in your basement, getting the REAL surprise ready. We are ever so happy to be back.
Will: Your basement is pretty nice, Loyal Content Consumer. Unless you have a crawl space … then we’re a little cramped. We’re going to race through a backlog of books, starting with the one — Parasomnia — that’s breaking the only goddamned rule we had here before moving on to two that are more solidly in our wheelhouse, Beyond the Breach and Bunny Mask. But before we get there, let me ask you this question that definitely has nothing to do with the books for this week: Where do you fall on the question of explaining/over-explaining just what the hell is going on in your comic book? How much exposition is too much? Or too little?
Justin: I think it’s a fine line, for sure. One that I am not sure that Parasomnia gives enough of a fuck about to really try and walk. But I digress.
People kind of grouse about exposition, but that doesn’t make it any less necessary. At least, to a point, I’ll say. Basically you need enough to really try and bait the hook for your book, but not too much, lest you overwhelm the reader and over-telegraph your main hook. A lot of #1 issues have done this really well, but twice as many have totally biffed it. I am still not sure where one of our featured titles falls on that scaling, but we are going to get into it!
Will: Again, that question had nothing to do with anything. Probably.
Justin: No, of course not! Just some cas [Grote’s note: ual. Casual.] conversation here between two easygoing bros …
Parasomnia: We Think We Understand What We Read, Maybe
Will: This was the thing that made me feel dirty, picking up a Dark Horse book for our column on AfterShock comics. Is there nothing sacred in this fallen world? At least it’s still Maniac of New York/Bunny Mask artist Andrea Mutti’s work, right? J-Man, I’ve gotta say: The first read through this, I didn’t care for it at all — I thought the transitions between the real world and the imaginary/dream/whatever scape were too jarring, and I couldn’t follow what the fuck was happening in the least. But you know, on reread, I think it started to gel a little better. What did you think of this one generally?
Justin: It’s a weird one, for sure.
For one thing, I am loath to really call this book “horror.” I know Bunn has set up a nice little genre fiefdom at Dark Horse now and seeing more Andrea Mutti artwork here is a real treat, but I can’t really get a handle on the genre Bunn wants this title to trade in.
Taking a valiant stab at a summary, just so we can kinda parse through it together, Parasomnia seems to be a few stories stacked on top of each other. A wandering homeless man is trying to find a place to bed for the night amid the flyers for a missing child whose parents have yet to give up hope of finding.
Meanwhile, as we follow the man, we are also shown a sort of turn-of-the-century swashbuckler, fighting and stealing through a nightmarish colonial world that is also plagued with actual ghosts and monstrous townsfolk.
I truly wasn’t expecting a sort of Robert E. Howard vibe from this title, but Bunn and Mutti seem to be really activated about these scenes. The narration takes on a tersely beautiful wording, and the action is wonderfully rendered in a sort of hazy, Mignola-inspired style. But we really aren’t given any story purchase for anything that’s happening on panel. We bob back and forth between this “dream world” and the real world, following characters we don’t know that then further don’t really do that much.
Bunn clearly has a longer game going here, setting up obvious similarities between the Highwayman and the homeless man, while also telegraphing an overlap between the settings. But I would have liked to have been given SOMETHING in this first issue to really hold onto. Some sort of story real estate, no matter how small, to make me care about these people and why they are doing what they are doing. The small pops of family drama we get from the grieving parents is certainly something (and something Bunn consistently writes well), but I dunno. It’s odd. It reads more like a tone poem than an actual narrative. Like a kind of half remembered dark fairy tale.
Will: I think you did a better job at summarizing than I could have. Thematically, structurally, I recognized the DNA of a few things in this one — a touch of Fearscape, a dash of Undone by Blood, a sprinkling of Heavy Rain for good measure. I’m not saying Bunn and Mutti cribbed from any of those things; I’m just saying I read this, and it made me think of those works. Did this evoke anything for you?
Justin: Definitely Undone by Blood, for sure. This issue has the same dual narrative/genre-hopping attitude Undone by Blood did, but its lack of focus on one particular genre (like UBB’s clear Western influence) keeps it from really flourishing. I also got some real The Dregs vibes from it, too; it too being about a mentally shaky man trying to make sense of his new world through the lens of a fantasy life.
Like I said above too, REH also is a real flavor of this as well. The specificity of the Highwayman’s costuming and the particular wording of this section’s narration really screamed “Pulp Short Story” to me. I think it just might be doing too many things to really do any of them that well. It’s certainly interesting and has a look that will make it jump from the shelves to a casual buyer. But I’m not really sure it’s that successful of a #1 issue. Maybe a bit of focus or narrative clarity would have made it pop a bit more for me.
Will: The second issue came out last week — do you think people should pick it up?
Justin: At the risk of sounding mean, I don’t think so. I think this might be a thing better served in a trade or collection. That way we get the full scope of what Bunn is really reaching for.
Which is a bummer! Bunn is usually so great at pacing out a first issue and delivering well on the concept of his books in the opening pages. But Parasomnia #1 really doesn’t lift off much, and it’s a disappointment, one I’m not sure would appreciate upward just with a second issue.
Will: Stay tuned, Loyal Content Consumers. We’ll get it to it … soonish?
Beyond the Breach: A Forest Full of Dick Munchers
Will: With our second book, we retreat to the safety of AfterShock’s loving embrace with Beyond the Breach. We get more exposition here — Vanessa is getting over a cheating bastard ex by taking a trip to the California coast, and all is well (aside from the heartbreak) until monsters show up and start eating the shit out of people — and the flow is much smoother. What did you think about this ’un?
Justin: I dug it! A lot more than I expected to!
For one thing, I think this opener moves much better than Parasomnia’s opening. We start pretty much in media res, Vanessa is already in transit away from what happens before this story and barely a few pages later Brisson is already complicating matters. Hard.
I also very much appreciate how this #1 immediately injects some stakes into the action. Brisson has always been pretty good at that, but this one feels particularly breezy in the best way. There is a girl and she’s hurt and then suddenly this big, weird thing happens and she has to deal with it. Like Will said, it just feels smooth. Both production-wise and narratively.
Will: I’ll be straight with you: I had two central complaints here. The first is that Vanessa’s voice is all wrong unless she’s a very specific breed of More Vulgar Delta Burke Southern. (Being a Texan yourself, I’m sure you know the type.) Calling monsters “dick munchers” and complaining about an “ass-scratching, finger-sniffing” ex yells Southern drawl to me. And while Vanessa may indeed be from the South (Her sister is currently in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and that’s our only clue pointing squarely in the wrong direction), it seems unlikely. Am I reading too much into this, or is her voice off to you?
Justin: No, I think it’s something worth calling out. I also think Vanessa falls into that very easy trap modern writers get tripped up with, the Young Person Speak trap. It’s not super egreious here, but I would kick myself if I didn’t say that her “What The Actual Fuck?!” rung a little tinny for me. There is also how the issue’s back matter, concerned with the itinerary of Vanessa’s trip, muddies her age further. It’s really focused on The Goonies (an inspiration Brisson has cited for this title), so that makes me wonder just how old exactly Vanessa is supposed to be.
None of this is stuff that torpedoes the opening issue, but it could use some shoring up, for sure.
Will: My second problem is that Otsmane-Elhaou tries way too hard. Irregular balloon shapes, huge words, weird colors — so many tricks in one issue makes for exhausting reading. Bad lettering can absolutely ruin a book, no doubt. But lettering that’s desperate to show off can also drag a book down as well.
Justin: Now, see, I am hotter on this than you, but I can totally understand how it’s frustrating. Here recently our work channels were A’LIGHT with discussion about lettering, specifically cursive type and these kinds of “animated” balloons. Being the Spawn Person I am and devotee of Tom Orzechowski, I am generally in favor of a letterer doing The Most. Hassan is absolutely on that side of the street for me, too.
BUUUUUUT, I do sometimes take issue with them. Especially when the typeface is so cramped together I lose what the actual narration is. Thankfully, none of that stuff seems to be here in this #1, but I do understand how stuff like that can get in the way of one’s enjoyment of a single comic.
Will: I will forever be on Team Calm the Hell Down in Your Lettering. My shit aside, I thought this really was a neat little book, and I’m looking forward to where it goes in #2.
Justin: YEAH, SAME! I am curious to spend more time with our adventure party, especially after the opener’s cliffhanger (which I genuinely did not expect). Horror needs more “road movies,” and I am happy to travel along further with this one for the time being.
Bunny Mask: Like a Pocket, But Made of Skin
Will: My dude, what’s the fastest 0-60 you’ve ever been in a dating situation?
Justin: I genuinely can’t think of one, and that’s not me trying to feign or front as some kind of person that has a leveled dating history. The thing is, when you have as many comics as I do and talk as much as I do about the bullshit I do, you don’t find yourself in too many sexy shenanigans.
That said, there was this one time in college where I was supposed to just watch El Topo with a girl over a night and we ended up watching the whole of that particular Jodorowsky set she owned. It took basically a whole weekend into Monday’s classes. SO HOT, I know.
Will: Do not sell yourself short, fella — you know that’s someone’s dream scenario out there. I asked because that was my favorite stretch of Bunny Mask #2, a fun little three-page chunk that showed how quickly Tyler and Bee, now both 14 years (mostly) removed from their imprisonment in the cave under Bee’s father’s delusions, are hitting it off. Those pages aren’t really the series’ bread and bloody butter, but I thought they worked and were pretty funny.
Justin: NO, TOTALLY and I think it brings an intriguing “mundaneness” to this issue. As we weave in and out with check-ins with the titular masked lady, we get these fun touchstones into normal, everyday life. People are still dating and talking and just living while this spectre of death stretches her powers and influence. They aren’t like groundbreaking scenes, but they are a nice “grease cutter” for the obvious creepiness of the other scenes
Will: What’s your current read on Bunny Mask the character? It seems like a spectre of vengeance crossed with some thing obsessed with secrets and wrapped in a mystery? I’m not any closer to figuring out where this book is going, but there’s a weird little charm to it — sweet and sexy and nuckin’ futs.
Justin: YEAH, it’s still hard to get a bead on her, but I am not frustrated with thinking about it yet. We talked in our discussion, off page, about this book, how it’s telling us SOMETHING but not EVERYTHING just yet. We are still getting a sense of her powers and how she can walk into the “normal world” while bringing others into HER WORLD (Read: The Snitch Cave). We also see a little bit of the kind of victims she chooses, this round gutting a pair of gross dudes who were planning on some human trafficking.
Nothing has been made really that explicit just yet, but I am still on edge every time she shows up on panel. She’s been a really effective character thus far, despite her sparse appearances in her own book.
Will: Again, I’ve got no sense where this is going. But I’m into it.
Short Shocks
- Bunny Mask lettering > Beyond the Breach lettering. Smooth, effective and not distracting.
- The AfterShock variant cover galleries are just getting better and better.
Will Nevin loves bourbon and AP style and gets paid to teach one of those things. He is on Twitter far too often.
