Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Vampirella 84


No two ways about it, this is quite a poor issue. The cover is by Steve Harris, in his only Warren cover. Vampi's story for this issue is "Phantasmagoria of Terror" by Jim Janes & Rudy Nebres (art) and Bill Dubay (story). The story features Vampi, Pantha and Adam confronting a man with psychic powers and a motorcycle gang. Just horrid, horrid story.

The issue's only real quality story, "Vampire Bite" by Auraleon (miscredited to Jose Ortiz) and Nicola Cuti (story). A man seeks a real vampire to bite his wife since she is sick and going to die soon. Eventually he gets his wish, but she ends up being cremated without his knowledge!

Third is "Steak-Out" by Abel Laxamana (art) and Jean Michelle Martin (story). The story is about a guy who goes on a planet of vegetable people and his encounter with a vegetable vampire, which he kills by driving an actual steak into its heart.

Fourth is "Final Act" by Pizarro (art) and Pierce Askegren (story), about an actor whose consciousness is put into the movie, where he is repeatedly killed. He gets so sick of it that he kills himself.

Last is "Native Strain" by Val Mayerik & Jeff Easely (art) and Marc Laidlaw (story) about vampires plotting to use a blood blank and blood transfusion of their own blood to take over the world.

With four out of five stories featuring vampires in some form or another, this issue is just painfully repetitive. In addition, the final three stories are all done by writers that did very little for Warren; its not hard to see why as none of the stories were that good.

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