Vamp #4

Vamp #4

Mythos Comics 2020

Created & Written by Jim Eckels

Illustrated by Emmanuel Bazin

Julian and his posse track Bruno and his bloodsucking bros to an abandoned RV in the desert. What's waiting for them inside is more frightening than a keg party with no beer - Bruno has blossomed into a blood-crazed monstrosity, and the showdown with Julian will change the future of Sanctus forever.

Here’s what I absolutely love about this, it is one of the best new mythology centring on Vampires that I have seen in a very long time. Sin City home to a mob style vampire ring and Julian while being the face of the organisation, hey he can be around in daylight and he’s been around for a very very long time, and he cleans up the messes made what Jim and Emmanuel have done is introduced us to a world that we want to see so much more of. It is almost like CSI for the supernatural set. So if Vampires are running around what else is roaming the land that we don’t know about? See this whole story has gone and done a number on me so that I am fully engaged and keep thinking way beyond what’s been provided.

The way that this is being told is really bloody brilliant. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is perfectly presented. Just seeing how this is structured and how the layers within the story don’t stop, not even at the last page, allow us to hope that we’ll be seeing much more to come. The character development is fabulous! How we see them act and react to the situations and circumstances they encounter really fleshes them out beautifully. The pacing here is amazing and as it takes us through the pages revealing the twists and turns along the way.

I am totally enjoying the way we see this being done because not only does this wrap the arc up nicely but it does open up a whole lot of different avenues still to be explored. Some of what we see here is as twisted as it comes and I gotta say that is among the highlights of this issue. Also Ben’s journey here is far from over and what happens with him next is going to be something I wanna see as well.

The interiors here are really rather lovely. How we see this painted watercolour style going on with the linework is exceptional work. The attention to detail that we see really is extraordinary and whether it is in the humans, the monster or what happens to him all of it really does look and feel absolutely beautiful. If there is one detractor it would be I want to see more backgrounds being utilised. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a remarkable eye for storytelling. Oh how we see the various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work is exceptionally rendered. The choices of colour too really make how we see this as inspired as it is.

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The way that this has been told and can be told still in the future is something that people need to stop and take notice of. There are a lot of great small publishing houses like Mythos who have these amazing creators putting out some astonishing books. This has me extremely excited for what’s still to come and whatever it is as long as we see Julian again I’ll be one happy camper.