Grimm Tales of Terror Quarterly 2021 Halloween Special

Grimm Tales of Terror Quarterly 2021 Halloween Special

Zenescope Entertainment 2021

Written by Jay Sandlin

Illustrated by Guillermo Fajardo, Sergio Arino, Juan Franciso Mota

Moy R. & Hakan Aydin

Coloured by Grostieta, Maxflan Araujo, Clau Violette, Edwin

Estrada & Vinicius Andrade

Lettered by Sean Konot

With tons of blood-dripping pages of horror-filled story, join Keres, the Goddess of Death as she brings her own brand of justice this year to those attending a haunted theme park during the height of the horror season!

What a spectacular issue this is. The concept is amazing and I really like how we meet Nathan and as we learn his story we begin to see the story itself take shape. What I like about this is that everything seems pretty straightforward and yet Jay has plans that don’t necessarily go straightforward and I have to say this is some of the better writing of his that I think we’ve seen thus far. He’s becoming a stronger and stronger storyteller and this issue really showcases that. I also like how we see Nathan go from this simpering fool to the confident man throughout each of these vignettes and I gotta say that it is interesting that the more you feel like you are getting away with something the stronger and more invincible you seem to become.

I really like the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceptionally well. The character development that we see through the dialogue, the character interaction as well as how we see them act and react to the situations and circumstances which they encounter really does a magnificent job bringing these characters to life. The pacing is excellent and as it takes us through the pages revealing vignette after vignette we are thrilled, entertained and engaged so thoroughly.

I really like the way that we see this being structured and how the layers within the stories emerge, grow and strengthen. Even though there are vignettes each one centres on Nathan and through him and his actions we see so much depth, dimension and complexity to the story. There’s one main theme that runs throughout the book and it ties the entire issue together beautifully. How we see everything working together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is impeccably achieved.

Each vignette has a different art team and there’s not one segment that isn’t beautifully rendered. So as I talk about this I’m generalising them all together because in all honesty I’d be very repetitive if I did them all together. The linework that we see is clean, crisp and sharp and with the varying weights and techniques being utilised to create the attention to detail we see throughout is extremely well rendered. We see backgrounds being utilised throughout because of the nature of the story itself and that’s amazing to me as they do wonders in enhancing and expanding the moments. They also work within the composition of the panels to create the depth perception, sense of scale and the overall sense of size and scope to the story. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show some remarkably talented eyes for storytelling. The various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work shows a great understanding of how colour works. Also the creativity and imagination that we see throughout is spectacular, particularly Shiverdale.

​

This is the kind of storytelling that I really want to see more of. It has that ultimate creep factor to it, it’s got twists and turns more whiplashing than the rides we see and it generates this crazy amount of tension and unease and this is what horror comics should do and be about and if Jay is going to continue writing for Zenescope these are the stories he needs to be doing.