Friday, October 11, 2013

Review- VINCENT PRICE PRESENTS VOL. 6 TP


VINCENT PRICE PRESENTS VOL. 6 (Bluewater, 2013; Softcover)

Collects Vincent Price Presents Nos. 2, 6, 12, and “The Hampster”, which I cannot find (cover dates October, 2008- August, 2009)

Writers: Nick Lyons and Chad Helder

Artists: Bang Thai, R.H. Stewart, and Giovanni Timpano

Colorists: Alexander Tobler, Jesse Heagy, and Ryan S. Burt

This is readable Horror stuff, but the artwork is pretty bad. The stories themselves are okay, but the artwork and coloring are strictly amateur hour. I mean, the artwork stinks. The first two stories are about a gumshoe detective who stumbles onto macabre happenings. There is some potential to this tried and true scenario but it is squandered by the subpar artwork.

This is a print on demand book, available at www.comicfleamarket.com. I do not understand the whys and wherefores as to how Bluewater collects their issues. Why not just collect every issue? It's not like these issues in this book are their best foot forward or anything. I have read a few single issues of the title over the years and there are certainly higher quality ones than these to choose from. I am more disappointed that the potential of this title hasn't been realized as much as I am in the low quality of these stories.
Junk Food For Thought rating: 2 out of 5.

The OCD zone- The mapping of this book is pure clowntown. The pages are out of sequence in chapter one (Issue 6), making it seem like you are reading some Garth Ennis time displaced story...only you're not, it's just that someone made a huge mistake mapping this book out. A page in chapter 2 is repeated. Both sides of the same sheet of paper have the same page.

There is no indication where these issues were originally published. I had to waste a fair amount of time on various comic book database sites and still wasn't able to piece everything together. Terrible. There are also typos on the Table of Contents on the inside of the front cover.

The cover to issue 1 is used for chapter 4, even though it is not issue 1 which is reprinted. The covers of this series are some of the best things about it, and yet they are rarely collected in these books. Why? The only thing that I can guess are royalties.

DVD-style Extras included in this book: Extras? I'd have been happy with the basics, like listing which issues are collected in this particular book!

Paper rating: 4.25 out of 5. This has a surprisingly decent weight coated stock paper, which shocked me given the independent, small press print on demand thing. I like it.

Binding rating: 3 out of 5. While the glued binding is solid and doesn't creak, man is it tight. It takes a lot of effort to hold open and read. If the book were heavier it could be used as a pectoral workout machine. Having said that, I have zero concern about this book falling apart. I believe that I will fall apart before this binding will.

Cardstock cover coating rating: 4.5 out of 5. While the cover doesn't have a super thick lamination, it is decent and scuff resistant. I'm happy.



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