Aliens: Dead Orbit is a Venn diagram of awe, depression and the ghost of salvation, all splayed on 6.63” x 10.24” paper that feels as big as the universe at its most indifferent. Yes, protagonist Wascylewski matches wits with the Xenomorphs and facehuggers, but Stokoe’s art begs what’s the point in a celestial vacuum of hope, light years from any aid. Though this miniseries utilizes one of the most iconic horror franchises in film history, it builds on its foundation by imposing a sheer sense of scale and futility. Zoom in tightly enough, and one lone space engineer sits stranded in the wasteland.

In Aliens: Dead Orbit, the cartoonist uses his talent to shape a cosmic graveyard of space junk, dwarfing in scope and mind-numbingly vast. As seen in Orc Stain and his Godzilla runs, a microscope is required to appreciate Stokoe’s images in their hyper-articulate, chiseled depth. Like fellow precision artists Geof Darrow and the late, great Bernie Wrightson, James Stokoe doesn’t stop drawing until nearly every millimeter of canvas is shaded, hatched and stylized. Watching lovable goofball Jughead transform from a burger-devouring lunkhead to a people-devouring lunkhead may be hard to stomach for longtime readers, but it does make for a delicious horror comic. Each panel could be its own Giallo film poster from the ‘70s, the mood coloring echoing director Dario Argento’s hyper-stylized gel lighting. But this churning requiem for youth wouldn’t read so beautifully if not for artist Francesco Francavilla, channeling the dark side of Riverdale in reams of inky shadow. Though releases are few and far between, Afterlife hits a note of drama-heavy dread that’s not afraid to veer and twist among an electric ensemble, each character hiding a cemetery of skeletons in their closet. Archie Chief Creative Director and current Riverdale showrunner Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa matured Archie, Veronica, Jughead, Betty and the other varsity-jacket icons with a teen rating and a buffet of human organs in this excellent series. In 2013, the Archie editorial crew took the definition of on-brand and fed it to a ravenous horde of flesh-eating shamblers. I still get chills every time the coven of vampires make their slow, vicious descent on the townsfolk, unaware of the true horror that’s come for them. However, this script comes from the hands of narrative stalwart Steve Niles, one of the masters of modern horror comics, and Templesmith’s cold, brutal artwork fit perfectly. True to the title, a small population experiences 30 days of continual night during the winter. In honor of Halloween, this list proudly presents our favorite comic book chillers, thrillers, slow burns and monster mashes, guaranteed to terrify and provoke readers with all the gory gifts this niche offers.Įvery time I read Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith’s grisly vampire yarn, 30 Days of Night, I say the same thing over and over: “How did no one ever think of this genius story before?” The setting? Barrow, Alaska-the top of the world. Despite the beating the genre took from the ensuing Comics Code Authority, horror has spent the following decades creeping out of the recesses around mainstream publishing, with Dark Horse, Vertigo, Image, Humanoids and various manga lines filling our nightmares with harrowing new atrocities. When psychiatrist Frederic Wertham published the misguided comics-skewering Seduction of the Innocent in 1954, the moral crusade was in response to the glorious groundswell of murder, corpses and grotesquery on the comics rack.

Aided by publishers like Warren and EC, the horror genre built itself into the foundation of sequential art just as vigorously as superheroes, romance or science fiction.

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