Pageturn: American Vampire Comics That Aren’t “American Vampire”

Hey you! Have you ever wanted to read some different comics? Hopefully! Do you have a friend who you are always trying to get into comics? Yeah, you probably have 20! Are you looking for a comic list made in tribute to Snyder and Alburquerque’s “American Vampire” returning even though the list doesn’t actually have “American Vampire” on it? Well aren’t you in luck! If you answered yes to at least one of those questions then boy do I have the article for you! In Pageturn, I’m going to break down comics genre by genre and give you the best recommendations you can pester yourself and others into reading.

Some rules before we start (Even though I’ll almost certainly break all of them)
1. No superheroes
2. No Marvel or DC (maybe a sneaky Vertigo here and there)
3. Mostly modern reads

Redneck

I feel like this column has a pretty common pattern, I suggest a comic that’s secretly a western, you guys get comfortable with some more soulful picks over the next little while and then I sneak attack you with another comic about sad old men set in Texas. Anyway, completely unrelated, this month’s first pick is “Redneck” by Donny Cates and Lisandro Estherren, a comic about a family of southern vampires facing persecution led by sad, old competing patriarchs who all reflect aspects of post-western archetypes. Hey, if I’m anything, I’m reliable.

Okay, but “Redneck” is a genuinely beautiful book, probably the least spooky on this list despite having arguably the highest quantity of vampires. The Bowman family have worked to coexist with their local community despite their vampirism, running a small BBQ restaurant and living off cow’s blood, it’s the epitome of that ‘it ain’t much but it’s honest work’ meme. But when this life starts falling apart for them we see just how much they’ve lived with optimism but prepared with pessimism. They’re a persecuted community and their escape from society shows just how constantly aware of that they are. The cycles of deconstruction and reconstruction of familial structures really comes to a head in the third volume of the series where Cates and Estherren properly delve into the longevity of these people’s emotional connections. That’s what works so well about this book, it’s a slow burn and it has the real estate to capitalize on that. The book will be creeping past the 30-issue mark this year and it’s grown so much in that period. Not only that but the story stays tight all throughout, it doesn’t have to get hung up on worldbuilding if it’s not in service of the character, it just sticks to that strong premise; there’s vampires, they’re a family, it’s all an allegory, bam you’re off to the races. From the first issue it sets up all it’s pieces and over the course of the run it’s been knocking them down, plot with purpose, got to respect it.

Lisandro Estherren isn’t the artist you’d expect for “Redneck,” and he’s not trying to play to those expectations. However, he is one of the better picks for something that straddles so many moods and genres, he’s got a really utilitarian grip on tension, violence, comedy and emotion, and can bounce between them without any whiplash. When this book needs to be a sand-whipped western, Estherren is ready. When it needs to be an ambient concept-comic, Estherren is ready. When you need to blow up a house and fill it with a christian blood-cult, you know that Estherren is ready. I think he’s one of the most underrated talents in Donny Cates’ rapidly expanding collection of artists, and more of a spotlight needs to be put on the incredible indie artists who have elevated his stories.

This is probably one of the most new-reader friendly books I’ve spotlighted in this column, it’s digestible, it’s easy to get invested in, it covers a huge variety of genres and it doesn’t seem like it’s slowing down any time soon. I also want to say just how refreshing it is to have one of these ‘southern inhospitality’ comics that can be audibly and consistently LGBTQIA+ friendly, so often the silence in that field is deafening. But yeah, I really can’t wait to see where the Bowman family ends up in their high stakes adventure (I promise I’m only gonna make that pun once).

Grab it if you like:
-Vampires out of their element
-Longform action/family dramas
-Art that can seamlessly move with the mood

If you like “Redneck” read:
-”Babyteeth” by Donny Cates and Garry Brown
-”Outcast” by Robert Kirkman and Brian Azaceta
-”That Texas Blood” by Chris Condon and Jacob Phillips

30 Days of Night

“30 Days of Night” is possibly the strongest concept on this list (and that’s why it’s the one with a perfectly serviceable Josh Hartnett film adaptation raking in the big bucks), a clan of vampires descend on a town in Northern Alaska right as they enter the interminable night of the alaskan winter, chaos ensues, blood hits the snow and suddenly you have a group of stragglers stuck in a horror movie with a couple dozen slashers. The “30 Days of Night” series justifies just why it’s endured so perfectly in this opening story by taking the most isolated setting you could and still building a world from it. This comic is unique, punchy and probably sings its own praises better than I ever could, so strap in and prepare yourself for “a showdown at the top of the world.”

The element that elevates this comic from a strong concept to a unique work is Australia’s own Ben Templesmith whose fog-ridden art draws this perfect middle ground between style and brutality. Everything in this book just clicks, the tones, the colors, the letters all just mesh to form this overriding sense of quiet powerlessness and it really sells the survivalism at the core of this book. The whole tone is weirdly cinematic but in a kind of motion-blurred windswept way. Y’know,q halfway between Mandy and The Thing. It might seem like something you just don’t jive with straight away but this book has these perfect little moments where the layers and the linework all just click together and you feel the guttural emotion behind the script. Whether it’s the bleeding teeth of a vampire shrugging off buckshot, the hand-written onomatopoeic crackle of a fire, or the faces of two lonely people keeping the peace at the edge of the world, Templesmith can bottle it in a single image. He also just happens to be really good at drawing blood and fire which there is A LOT OF in this book.

Steve Niles is such a sleeper hit of a writer, just ducking in and out of the spotlight while consistently releasing these thematically overlapping horror books that are like the best of Burton left to age up a couple years. I really don’t think I’ve read anything else that nails the interplay between survivalism and nihilism quite like “30 Days of Night”, this book just has that constant feeling of attrition and genocide in the background and you don’t even see that slaughter anyway. I know that sounds like nothing special but it’s kind of remarkable, Steve Niles makes the audience feel somber for a tragedy they never even saw. I just respect this book so much for just swinging for the fences all while staying so centrally grounded, it’s at this intersection of classic gothic and grindhouse with the most vampire-y vampire king ever and yet it still has heart to it! Seriously, I was grinning like an idiot way more than I should’ve been for a book like this.

“30 Days of Night” is a stone cold classic (averaging between 14 and 30 degrees fahrenheit, actually) that has earned its reputation. It’s a watershed horror comic that is so understatedly creative in its concept, presentation and execution. This book solidified the careers of Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith, lending the industry two brilliant and driven creators who will carve out a perfect niche for you if you let them in. And hey, right now it might just be nice to know that there’s some hope amongst the isolation.

Grab it if you like:
-Violence that cuts through stylistically
-Vampires free to cause carnage
-Perfectly executed horror plotting

If you like “30 Days of Night” read:
-”October Faction” by Steve Niles and Damien Worm
-”Roughneck” by Jeff Lemire
-”Bog Bodies” by Declan Shalvey and Gavin Fullerton

Loud!

Maria Llovet’s original graphic novel “Loud!” isn’t necessarily the vampire-iest book on this list, honestly I went into this pretty blind, I didn’t even know the bloodsuckers were going to be in this (sorry you guys don’t get that genre-shock), but it is sure as hell the most atmospheric. “Loud!” is like this incredible mix of silent storytelling that is still imbued with endless sound and space and atmosphere, every character is instantly defined through fashion and physique, the little individual narratives are established in a heartbeat through symbols and motifs, the central nightclub is overflowing with personality, this book is such a gem and yet I can hardly even describe the plot to you.

This is undeniably Llovet’s best work, it’s defined, it’s dense and its unadulterated in how it tackles the social themes her work has always been transfixed by. Like I said before, the dichotomies created between glamour and grunge in subject matter (the hyper stylised versus the suffocation of disappointing realities), character (decadent vampires versus romanticist monster hunters), and sexuality (not even going to try shove this into a binary) is all so concerted and it makes the whole book spark. Llovet has this really scratchy line work that works so well for the rough edges of this unsterilised environment, while also bringing some sharpness to characters who are admittedly covered in soft edges (they’re naked, that’s the innuendo there, I don’t want anyone reading that differently). Alongside artists like DANI and Otto Schmidt, I think it’s a style of sketchy art that kind of emphasises the fashion of the characters through the ever-present nature of the pencilling, you’re seeing so much passion in one art form so you see all the thought and style imbued in the other form being portrayed. God I love fashion comics.

I think a lot of the time when you see artists make the leap to solo projects there’s a tendency for the narrative to slow down, which makes sense. It gives them a chance to lean into the visual storytelling and give their art the real estate it never gets anywhere else. I think “Loud!” still has those tenets but it manages to keep the spectacle, all while sprinting at full pace. It’s like filling a car with rocket fuel. This book speeds through like a pinball, bouncing between about as many narratives as one too. I think I talked about something similar last month with ”Assassin Nation” and its ability to set up and wrap up a huge number of narratives concisely, but it’s so satisfying starting a comic off with this jam packed nightclub and then just waging a war of attrition on your own stories until you finish with this deft, precise closing bow.

Llovet’s ability to fit in this much story, commentary and personality is such a great indicator of her artistic versatility and I really love Black Mask for publishing these sorts of laterally creative comics. I really don’t think there’s a single other media product I’ve seen that so concisely skewers rave culture, both revelling in its intensity while showing how ingrained self destruction and uncomfortable transgression is to it. Basically it’s Blade II crossed with Eyes Wide Shut. Where “Redneck” was a soulful, contemplative story, “Loud!” will spit in your eye, make you pay $20 for a vodka and coke, and leave you wondering why you still love dancing to ‘Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger.’ This book is so defined and so sure of that definition, wherever Llovet goes next you’re going to have to follow.

Grab it if you like:
-Stylish fashion comics
-Fast-paced action and atmosphere
-The living dead of the musical underground

If you like “Loud!” read:
-”Faithless” by Brian Azzarello and Maria Llovet
-”Fatale” by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips
-”Blue in Green” by Ram V and Anand Rk

On the Shelf: Dracula, Motherf**ker

Dracula is, at his core, the creepiest of old men. He’s a shrivelled old nocturnal artifact with insane dietary requirements. Of course it’s pretty hard to market Dracula as a horror villain if he looks one bad day away from a walking frame. How do most creators solve that problem? Simple. You make Dracula look young and spry and sexy, of course most creators are also cowards. So then, how do Alex de Campi and Erica Henderson (who’s on a two month streak now) keep Dracula creepy? Well you transplant him to the West Coast, splash in some grindhouse, some noir, some perfect 70s muscle cars and you make the Ol’ bloodsucker himself literally so threatening he defies physics. “Dracula, Motherf**ker” (or Drac Mofo if you live in coolsville like me) is a dream pairing working together on the most high octane graphic novella you could possibly distill onto the page, and it is here to drench you in blood, love and neon just to see which will knock you out first. Welcome to LA, hope you survive the night.

It’s crazy how well this book sits next to “Loud!” They both perfectly skewer that gentile party-culture/vampire-predator parallel. It makes sense though, vampire books should be kind of sexy despite the literal parasitic nature of them, they’re compelling monsters because they aren’t just slashers, they integrate, they get under the skin. Still, I’m not going to write off Drac Mofo as just some “Loud!” companion book because they both just revel in the specificity of their tone, “Loud!” is big and extreme, Drac Mofo is more intimate. It’s like a concert versus a cabaret. This book so deftly jumps from stark to cerebral to savage in its tight 60ish pages and most of that can be attributed to the perfect pacing of Henderson. She manages to carry the silent sections of the book with dense noir environments and then peels it away for the moments of momentary silence or intense character action. That’s all delightfully vague but the long short of it is, Erica Henderson is a treasure and she’s only getting better with this book. As I touched on, this book’s neo-neon-nouveau noir style is just so intoxicating to inhabit. The recontextualised protagonist Quincy Harker is a stringer who specializes in crime scene photography, which from the outset seems a hell of a lot like Nightcrawler, only instead of revelling in that voyeurism it shows the kind of disillusionment it breeds in response to creatures who are actual honest-to-god nightcrawlers. It’s insane to me how many thematic comparisons, genre-mashes and artistic polarities this book manages to infuse while still staying cohesive, it’s such a well-crafted piece that doesn’t even sacrifice fluency for the buckets of style it touts.

Okay I’m going to stop dancing around it, there are like a million beautifully specific tricks that Erica Henderson brings to this book that you will not see anywhere else. Oh my god the COLORS, she jumps between opaque cold palettes and saturated warm ones in such quick shifts while still keeping the art fluid, she even jumps into polaroids at one point and that is just the crispest thing you will ever lay eyes on. The best part is, it’s so central to the storytelling, every color has purpose and urgency, it honestly feels like the shades of each scene were there before even the linework. Wait yeah, I have to talk about the linework, don’t I? It’s a triumph. Obviously. Henderson’s inks are just as fluid as her colors and it lends so much motion to these static panels. By the end of the book some of the characters are literally quaking with motion and when I read it I thought I might have been passing out. I probably wasn’t far from it, honestly. I just love the way she renders her characters, all the faces are so squishy even though their expressions are so stern, it’s just this undercurrent of adorableness in the background. And then there’s Dracula. skin-crawling, amorphous, pollock-splatter Dracula. Henderson makes the comparison to the abstract works of Gustav Klimt in her portrayal of Vlad in this book and it absolutely fits. This guy is just Liquid Dracula. I know I’m taking the piss but it’s genuinely incredible looking at how she renders this guy, he’s just this mess of eyes and teeth and malice with these two gross Giuliani-looking old-man hands poking out amongst it all. I am in love with the way this pushes the boundary of comic art and I am even more in love with the audacity it takes to turn the oldest gothic monster in literary history into a bowl of porridge with murderous intent.

Alex de Campi has managed to shoot onto my radar this year with a host of amazing projects, and a graphic novella of this caliber was definitely the way to cement that. Image have pushing out so many amazing books in that format over this year and it’s been a boon in a year of pretty consistent bullshit, I mean “Bog Bodies,” “Pulp,” and “Dracula, Motherf**ker” have all been incredible, this is absolutely the time to make the OGN mainstream, seriously this book just did LA noir vampires in 60ish pages better than Angel did in like 6 seasons. Anyway, back to Alex, Drac Mofo is just delightfully pulpy, it really does feel like some lost script from the 70s that got axed and is only just making its way into the zeitgeist. I think there are some really valid criticisms about its cosmeticising of blaxploitation, but the themes this book does give real estate to are super well realised. It feels especially pertinent to have a book that’s willing to properly delve into mistreatment of women by ‘generous benefactors’ and the cycles of abuse and competitive alienation that comes with that. It’s an allegory that is sorely missing in gothic fiction and it’s endlessly gratifying to see it vocalised here by de Campi.

I hope that even if the actual contents of my description hasn’t persuaded you to give this book a try, the sheer amount I’ve prattled on about it might. “Dracula, Motherf**ker” is pushing the envelope in every way it can while still feeling sardonically reminiscent. It’s on the shelves now, but I can guarantee it will be in your memory forever.

Grab it if you like:
-beautifully intimate Hollywood noir
-revenge fantasies immersed in the modern rhetoric
-Gothic art unhinged

If you like “Dracula, Motherf**ker” read:
-”Bad Girls” by Alex De Campi and Victor Santos
-”Kabuki” by David Mack
-”Limbo” by Dan Watters and Caspar Wijngaard

Rulebreakers

Wolverine
Okay before you come after me, I’m sorry but I just haven’t read any notable “Blade” comicx, obviously the movies are great but he just has so few solo books and the ones I have read just weren’t that memorable. I love and respect the man, and he’s pretty cool in “Strikeforce,” but the world is lacking a truly memorable modern “Blade” run. So as a consolation prize I’m giving you the second best vampire hunter in the MU, our very own Wolverine. So on that note, the recent Logan/Omega Red/Dracula story in the Benjamin Percy run has been really great. Taking the Krakoa paradigm to a nation of Vampires is such a great idea, especially when they’re used to literally inhabit the parasitic nature of the gentry on disenfranchised, remote communities. On top of that it’s drawn by Viktor Bogdanovic who is just the perfect Greg Capullo lookalike. Now that’s not the nicest of compliments but it’s just undeniably true. It’s like his clone finally escaped from the “Batman” cage and is running rampant at the house of ideas, giving out skritchy, punk-rock pencils for all. I also remember the “Old Man Logan” Jeff Lemire/Filipe Andrade story being pretty cool. It had Vampire Jubilee, Baby Shogo, Monster Howling Commandos and some great art. That whole run was a great gem amongst a pretty forgettable era of ‘X-Men.’

Vampironica
Now technically, I don’t think this book even breaks the rules of the column, but it also still feels like a rulebreaker in my head. Archie Comics is a big old company with in-house characters, it’s just that these ones are high-schoolers rather than heroes (except for Jughead, who is both). Still, “Vampironica” is kind of way better than you’d expect it to be. It’s like the best of Buffy all while riffing on the Riverdale suite of characters. I really vibe with the Archie Horror imprint and how its just making these popcorn movie comics that are consistently fun. Plus it gives creators an excuse to make Reggie Mantle even more of a brat, as he should be.

B.P.R.D.: Vampire
I debated listing this as just every single time Mike Mignola as drawn or written something with vampires in it, but then “B.P.R.D.: Vampire” (and also “B.P.R.D.: 1947,” which leads into it) includes a team-up with two equally incredible talents, Gabriel Bá and Fábio Moon! This book is such a gruesome, drag-out war-story of what vampire fiction could be and it’s all just perfectly rendered. It also has one of the most compelling characterisations of Professor Bruttenholm, Hellboy’s underappreciated mentor who reaches a new level of tested morality here. I absolutely adore Bá and Moon, as well as the pedigree of projects they work in. Their contribution to “B.P.R.D.” is no different, bringing this new facet to the artistic language of Mignola, all while he brings a new level of complexity, pedigree and morality to the vampires of his world. If you want some other great Mignolaverse vampire stories then you can’t go wrong with “Hellboy: Wake the Devil,” ‘The Vârcolac’ or “Witchfinder: City of the Dead.”

Thank you all for reading, until next time.