Review by Luke Williams
The Book: Enter our nightmare world at your peril! Following the acclaimed 40 Years of Scream!, this companion volume features previously uncollected material from the holiday specials spinning out of the main title.
From the original run in the 1980s to the latest, oversized 40th anniversary issue, this collection completes the Scream! archives with stories by veteran writers and artists Dave Gibbons, Eric Bradbury, Barrie Tomlinson and Tom Tully, as well as recent revival strips including the work of Alex Paknadel, Torunn Grønbekk, Henry Flint, and DaNi.
The Review: For those who aren’t aware, Scream is a much loved 1980s British horror comic that last just a little longer than a mayfly. Hatched, matched and dispatched within four months, it merged with Eagle, later losing its place below that masthead after a few years.
However, as is the case with many IPC comics, it had an afterlife in a series of holidays specials between 1985 and 1989, filled with inventory material that often hadn’t seen publication elsewhere. Then, 30 years after the demise of the weekly, a short-lived revival in a series of Scream & Misty one offs between 2017 and 2020 following Rebellion’s purchase of the intellectual property.
Rebellion has already collected the few weekly issues of Scream in one handy (and large) volume last year. That seems to have sold very well, so this collection scoops up the remainder of the Scream related material published in the specials that were published in the five years after the demise of the weekly comic.
There is a definite and marked split between the 20th Century and 21st century material. The horror in the 1980s strips hasn’t aged that well for the most part. Bearing in mind these strips aren’t aimed at middle aged men, but targeted at early teenagers, most of the horror is “defanged”, the twists occasionally predictable and some strips verging on the whimsical.
Most of the main Scream strips are represented here: the one off series “Library of Death”, humour strip “Fiends and Neighbours”, “The Thirteenth Floor” “The Dracula Files” “Monster” text stories. Highlights from this earlier material include the Blas Gallego / Ian Gibson drawn sword and sorcery strip “Black Beth” (I’m a late convert to Gallego), and the strip closest to being disturbing, “Revenge” drawn by the underrated Jim Watson.
Making it easier for the reviewer, though frustrating for comic historians, Rebellion haven’t been able to identify all of the contributors to these early specials. (Records of writers of many British comics is frustratingly scant). However, what they have identified is a veritable who’s who of creators working in British comics from that period: Mike Western, Phil Gascoigne, Barry Kitson, Dave Gibbons, Steve Parkhouse, Geoff Senior, Ron Smith, John Cooper, Jose Ortiz, Graham Allen, Luis Bermejo, and more.
The more recent strips include some effective updates of the “classic” strips. They’re sharper, less campy, more sophisticated and, obviously, aimed at an older audience, including “Dracula Files”, “Black Beth” “Thirteenth Floor” and roping in the classic “Black Max” from Thunder and Lion, plus a slew of one offs, rounded off with a touch of humour in “Decomposition Jones”.
Accordingly, the more recent strips have contemporary creative teams including Kek W, Simon Coleby, Frazer Irving, Henry Flint, Jimmy Broxton, VV Glass, Leigh Gallagher, John Stokes, Guy Adams.
By and large, the first half of this collection, aside from the odd curio, is aimed at diehard Scream fans. Not having read the original comic perhaps its reputation has been burnished with age. It hasn’t the edge of Action, Battle, or 2000AD. More satisfying are the more recent strips, the reinventions of the older material are for the most part successful, Simon Coleby’s “Black Max” looks glorious and Guy Adams, John Stokes and others work on “Thirteenth Floor” are probably the most successful of the revivals. The art throughout is almost uniformly beautiful.
Fans of Scream, those longing for IPC’s early 1980s output or even British comics history, should pile in, but everyone else should perhaps just pick up the later specials from the Rebellion online shop.
Luke Williams
• Scream! The Specials 1985-2024 is available from all good bookshops | AmazonUK Affiliate Link | 400 Pages | ISBN: 978-1837865642
• Scream! The Specials 1985-2024 is also available for pre-order either in standard hardback or webshop-exclusive slipcase editions from the 2000AD webshop
• 40 Years of Scream! is available from all good bookshops | AmazonUK Affiliate Link | 464 Pages | ISBN: 978-1837861071
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Brought up on a diet of Commando, British Boys Annuals and Asterix, Lucas Williams’s day job limits his reading time. Luckily for everyone else this also restricts his writing time.
Categories: British Comics, British Comics - Current British Publishers, downthetubes Comics News, downthetubes News, Features, Reviews
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