‘Night of the Ghoul’ (review)

Written by Scott Snyder
Art by Francesco Francavilla
Published by ComiXology Originals /
Dark Horse Comics

Scott Snyder had a cool run of original books recently and this was one of the titles. This is an interesting horror book and it is a nicely self contained story.

Snyder is at his best when he uses horror elements in his work and he proves that again here.

He is teamed with one of the best horror artists in comics too, Mr. Francesco Francavilla, to make one of the more interesting and memorable entries in that genre.

The book is all about a lost film called Night of the Ghoul.

The film is legendary in that everyone who sees it is driven mad. A film researcher decides that it is time to track down the film and figure out the mystery behind it.

This leads him to track down the filmmaker who is responsible for creating this haunted movie.

Ultimately finding the researcher to find the director of the film in hospice.

It gets pretty crazy from there. We start to see that the staff of the hospital isn’t being too kind to the director. Is there a bigger reason behind that?

We also get to see different parts of the film as the researcher comes across it. What does it all mean? As the pieces come together slowly, things get darker.

Eventually, we get to see what it is all leading to. There is a lot of suspense.

Sadly, the ending didn’t excite me as much as I wanted it to. It’s still good, and Snyder hits all of the usual turns. It just didn’t get us anywhere new as far as storytelling. It is still very strong but it does feel like it comes up a bit short.

For his part, Snyder does a great job giving us a a story about many themes, most especially fathers and sons. The story is well constructed and the characters are pretty rich. The artwork by Francesco Francavilla is very strong as well. His coloring work is especially strong here too, and makes the whole book perfect as far as mood goes.

Overall, it is another strong book by top notch creators that doesn’t end as strong as I wanted it to. It is still very good, though.

RATING: A-