The Ugly American's Comfortably Bloated Halloween, Part 1: Werewolves!

When the Ugly American was just an ugly little boy, Christmas was the Cadillac of holidays. Christmas carried the ultimate trump card - a guaranteed assload of presents. And because you knew the presents were coming, there was the added bonus of sinfully painful anticipation. That's pretty tough to top.

But now that the Ugly American is an old man with ever more faltering plumbing and ever more crotchety joints, I have to say that Halloween is king. Carbohydrates? Yes, please! I like the more authentic sanctity of spirits, and fear barely held at bay. I don't know how much of Christmas has anything to do with sincere religious belief. That whole scene is so plagued by rampant commerce and political correctitude....all the vitality has been stripped out. I think a lot of people, even people who publicly would declare otherwise are afraid of ghosts in their guts. That, I like. I like the notion of acknowledging, facing, and making peace with monsters. Halloween is one of the few holidays that doesn't mind being sexy, either. What's not to like?

So all this month, The Ugly American is doing Halloween....a comfortably bloated Halloween. Let's talk about werewolves, shall we? YES!

Kiss Me,Satan! # 1
Dark Horse Comics
Script: Victor Gishcler
Art: Juan & Eduardo Ferreyra

Kiss Me, Satan! is the story of Barnabus, a fallen angel looking to make good by protecting a coven of comely witches from a pack of werewolves.

Story-wise, I really enjoyed the fact that Kiss Me stayed true to the old K.I.S.S. formula: Keep It Simple, Stupid! So many of these types of stories end up falling flat these days because they are primarily concerned with not telling you the story. The point lately is make a lot of jump-cuts out of time and dribble little crumbs of stuff that might be a story later on.... but in the meantime here's some people you don't care about doing things you don't understand.

Not so, here. The character is instantly identifiable. He's a noir template hard-boiled thumper. Nothing too fancy there, but the thing that Gischler did with Barnabus is soften him with a hint of self-doubt. On the outside he's all confidence and posturing, but internally he wonders if he's bitten off more than he can chew, and makes tactical mistakes. If he's just hyper-confident, that gets a little grating. I can deal with spending time with Barnabus.

We've also got character motivation we can comprehend quickly. Of all the angels that rebelled against God, Barnabus is the one guy trying to win his way back into the fold. The deal is, he works for God now until the Almighty decides he's paid his debt. When is that? His contact (a ridiculous, pudgy little cherub named Julien) says he doesn't know. One gets the feeling that Team God might just be yanking his chain.

So Barnabus is stuck doing grunt work for a God that might never come through on his end of the deal, and meanwhile the minions of Satan don't take kindly to anybody breaking the union picket line. The angels don't accept him, the devils are pissed off that he's breaking ranks, and the werewolves he's been repeatedly shooting in the face don't seem particularly pleased with him, either.

Point being, after the first issue I know exactly who this character is, I completely understand what's motivating him, and there's tension everywhere because it's one man against (at least) three worlds. How rare is it these days to find a comic that sets the reader up so well? Keep It Simple, Stupids!

Which is not to say that there aren't any mysteries or subtleties involved. Barnabus has a little MacGuffin of a necklace with an attractive Goat of Mendez on it. It does some special stuff for him, we're not sure what just yet. We don't know anything about what prompted Barney to pursue heaven again, or how his contract work with God started.

Also undeveloped to this point is the idea that "New Orleans is a werewolf town." So far what it means is that the werewolves are abundant and in control, basically operating like the mob. They run prostitution and protection rackets, and other supernaturals presumably know that they enter New Orleans at their own risk. I think this comic graduates from "good" to "great" if Gischler can really flesh out that "werewolf town" aspect fully and show us how a city would uniquely develop under those circumstances. I don't think that's on his agenda, though.

The plot hammer works like this - Cassian is top dog of the New Orleans werewolf clan, and his wife Meredith has a little puppy-bun in the oven. Or does she? A witch with a mechanical Cthulhian eye
is brought in to determine if the baby carries the Mark of the Lycanthrope. No mark, no succeeding the pack leader. And in this case, Verona (who should definitely be voiced by Brad Bird in any animated adaptation) has bad news - no werewolf Mark for junior.

It's implied that if the child can't succeed the father, then pack leadership becomes a free-for-all bloody battle for the crown. Of course when Cassian works this out in his head he kills everybody in the room, and then determines that the only loose ends left to cut off are Verona and her apprentice witches.

So Cassian sends his trusted cadre of werewolf thugs out to assassinate Verona
and her crew, and Barnabus for some reason is contracted by heaven to protect them. Let the hijinx ensue!

And ensue they do, in all the glory that Juan Ferreyra can muster, which turns out to be quite a lot. I like the strong jawlines and facial expressions. I don't ordinarily notice the coloring in a comic, but I sure did in this case. All of the action sequences have a kind of blurred, painted motion effect that I was completely enamored with. Toward the back end of the book, there's a chase sequence that happens at night, and I really enjoyed the lighting effects and the ambience of that as well. In the credits, Eduardo Ferreyra is listed as providing "color assistance". I'm not sure what that means, but if it has anything to do with brushing out those blur lines, I'm way into his work.

I wouldn't describe Kiss Me, Satan! as a gore-fest, but the ample action displayed does not pull punches. Listen, when you pick up a werewolf comic, you're going to want a requisite amount of clawing, biting, and slashing wolf creatures. Satan does not disappoint in any of those categories. This is a comic with an eye toward hitting the accelerator in all phases. It sets up quickly, things move forward with minimal dawdling, and when the punches come they land hard.

If you were looking for something akin to Sandman, then I would pass on Kiss Me, Satan! If you were looking for straight horror, I think you're barking up the wrong tree. If you like high-action noir, you will feel very much at home here. You've got a flawed/damned protagonist blasting werewolves and rescuing dames...I love it!

Next up.....more lycanthropes when the Ugly American tackles Werewolf By Night # 14!