Kolchak the Night Stalker: The Lovecraftian Horror
Publisher: Moonstone Books
Writer: C.J. Hendersen
Artist: Jaime Calderon
This being my first column, I’m taking a moment to let you know what to expect here every week. I plan on using this column as a way to shine a light on some indy titles that otherwise you might never hear of. With that being said, let me start with the first title I think everyone should be reading! This week’s title is Kolchak: The Night Stalker: The Lovecraftian Horror by Moonstone.
For those of you unfamiliar with Kolchak: The Night Stalker, it originally was a TV series from the 70’s starring Darren Mcgavin. Kolchak is a mediocre reporter who tends to stumble across the supernatural and paranormal. He has faced vampires, werewolves, zombies, ghosts, aliens, and countless other things that go bump in the night. In this graphic novel he faces a horror far greater and far older than anything he has faced before. The minions of the ancient ones, Cthulu and Dagon! If you are unfamiliar with either Dagon or Cthulu, who are creations of H.P. Lovecraft, the comic does a great job of giving you enough back story on these two big bads. In this tale Kolchak is sent to a sleepy coastal town to investigate a body of a “fish man” that washed ashore. While looking into this body Kolchak uncovers a planned invasion into our dimension by the servants of these ancient gods. With a little help from Kolchak the government foils the invasion, and forces the foul beasts back to their own dimension!
This graphic novel is printed in “Widevision” which means the artwork is in the center of the page with the text on the top and bottom. The artwork is pretty good and it looks primarily painted. The story is well written and captures the love and hate relationship between Kolchak and his editor Tony Vincenzo very well. At times it truly felt as if Darren McGavin was still alive and right there with me. I’d suggest checking this title out. It’s a great read!
Scott Andrews
Hey, I did a cover for that book!
Really? Which one?
I’d LOVE to See it Ken, I’ve grown quite fond of Kolchak!
Sounds like a very interesting book. I dont know if I could get used to the text being like that though.
You get used to it pretty fast, and it gives the entire page to the artwork. There are a lot of other Kolchak comics out there that are done normal comic book fashion. I just haven’t picked em up or reviewed them yet.
Scott, if you want to see them, go to http://www.kenmeyerjr.com/comics/kolchaktwo.html and http://www.kenmeyerjr.com/comics/kolchak.html
Those are pretty cool Ken, I liked the graveyard scene. Were those for Moonstone? They are the only ones I know of who have done a Kolchak comic.
I like it when different styles are used for the placement of the art, text, panels etc.