The St. Louis Review of Comic Books | 2009.07.15

Nostalgia and something like reverence greet the revenant Creepy (Dark Horse, $4.99). Alas, beyond a sterling frontispiece by Bernie Wrightson, it rebuffs that greeting. This 48-page black-and-white quarterly horror anthology―heir and namesake of the ersatz EC magazine launched in 1964 by Warren Publishing―exhibits less genius than mediocrity. To be sure, the original Creepy scarcely published consistently great material, but the expectation of greatness should have dissuaded editor Shawna Gore from devoting pages in a quarterly to a serial, especially a serial as jejune as "The Curse" by writer Joe Harris and artist Jason Shawn Alexander. Prudence might also have suggested declining the murky, dreadful Auschwitz zombie story "Chemical 13!" by writer Michael Woods and artist Saskia Gutekunst. Two other contributions, meanwhile, waste typically wonderful art by Angelo Torres ("Hell Hound Blues") and Hilary Barta ("Loathsome Lore") on trivial narratives, and the final original piece, "All the Help You Need" by writer Neil Kleid and artist Brian Churilla, has an interesting premise but a wanting execution. The debut's closer―a reprint of the classic "Daddy and the Pie" by writer Bill DuBay with art by the late, great Alex Toth―merely emphasizes the gap between the new Creepy and the old. -- Bryan A. Hollerbach