Page 45 Review by Stephen
Huge, heavy, bigger-than-A-4 hardcover collection of stories featuring vampires and Slayers throughout the ages, written and drawn by some not inconsiderable talent.
Joss Whedon pops up everywhere, for example, his short story 'Stacy' illustrated by Cameron Stuart, wittily elevating the Orcs of fiction from mindless brutes to hive-minded brothers as seen from the newly awakened perspective of a similarly connected young vampire.
Gene Colan's pages in pencil, coloured by Dave Stewart, are among some of the finest I've seen whilst Vatche Mavlian as coloured with a refreshing restraint by Michelle Madsen presents us with a Jack The Ripper tale that's positively Wrightson-esque.
But the first of two stand-out pieces for me comes from Jane Espenson and P. Craig Russell (SANDMAN: DREAM HUNTERS, Gaiman's MURDER MYSTERIES, and his swoonaway art book). Russell's perfect for the stately home of lace, stucco and stuck-up aristos as a grand ball is held in Somersetshire, England, in 1813. It's a pretty sharp stab at Jane Austen (certainly more successful than any of the actual adaptations!) complete with social boundaries, negotiated etiquette, precision dialogue (like precision bombing, devastatingly delivered) and, necessarily, the presumptions of character which turn out to be entirely at odds with what eventually transpires.
The second, scripted by Becky Cloonan and illustrated by Vasilis Lolos (half of the team behind the nightmarish PIXU), is set very much in the present or at least the near future when, post-SEASON EIGHT, vampires have been revealed to the public to the extent that one is a reality TV star! 'The Thrill' refers to the only kicks young Jacob can get in his black-hole town, getting sucked off (at the neck) by the local vampire gang. "I just want to feel something".
There's a neatly played opening scene in which you're initially unsure whether Jacob is referring to the arcade game he's playing or a real ass-kicking, but it's another ass-kicking that's going to change his life, perspective and part in the pecking order.
Overwhelmingly the tales here are far from obvious and, just so you know, the book reprints TALES OF THE SLAYERS trade paperback, TALES OF THE VAMPIRES #1-5, the BROKEN DJINN one-shot, 'Dames' from the DRAWING ON YOUR NIGHTMARES HALLOWEEN SPECIAL, THE THRILL one-shot and 'Carpe Noctem' from Myspace DHP.
