Vampirella #672 // Review
She’s all sketched in black and white and she’s being chased by something menacing. They were creatures that she had created on the page back Whalen she was a kid over half a century into the future. Things continue to decay into chaotic peril in Vampirella #672. Writer Christopher Priest lends some poetry to the horrro action in another issue with artist lIvab F. Silva and colorist Werner Sanchez. The dark, horrifying absurdity of Vampirella’s worlds continue to twist into a kind of narrative that still manages to maintain narrative momentum as the series continues.
The monsters in question are Chupacabras. good isn’t going to be easy dealing with them. Particularly as it is the case that she sounds crazy. Everything sounds crazy about her current situation and she’s trying to understand it and trying to articulate it to somebody else happens to be in possession of a pair of handcuffs that are soon wrapped around her wrists. Elsewhere, someone approaches her. She’s not exactly receptive to some kid who fiancé need to follow her like a protégé. Some stranger. At the door. Completely at a loss. But looking for guidance as a vampire and there’s still more.
There’s always more. Reflected in an endless progression of different panels. Priest is managing, very tricky balance. The idea of true Multiverse of madness is one that’s kind of difficult to commit to the page without losing any sense of the motivation behind at all. The action in the series requires some very simple and visceral conflict. But a conflict in a series like this is more nebulous. So it can be really difficult to maintain any sense of narrative momentum. Priest does a pretty good job of it, though. And a lot of the reason why it has to do with the fact that he’s playing with some very relatable characterization between different members of the ensemble.
And there’s a jagged sense of disjointed this throughout the issue that continues to make a very distinctive appeal to the page. I it all hang together, quite successfully. Certain scenes are given a prominent presence in black-and-white. There’s some of the rest of it’s in more of a color sort of a mood. The overall visual package isn’t quite as disjointed as it would need to be to be truly disorienting. There’s a kind of consistency to it that goes along way towards providing the kind of momentum that priests need in order to bring across the full reality of the story with clear intentions, on some kind of resolution when it all comes through in the end.
Its intricacies make it very difficult to assess while it’s in progress. There are various things that priest and company could be doing to amplify the weird nature of it all. They could also be tied a little bit more into certain realities of the human heart. But it’s hard to tell exactly what metaphors priest is exploring as the story still continues to sprawl out in various directions. Time will tell.
