I’m sadly unimpressed with de Vries’s finish to Eternal Vows. It’s all supposed to be this great love story about this sailor and his squeeze in this little town. I thought de Vries was actually going to kill MacReady or something.

I swear I read these Thing comics back when I was a kid and they were a lot more sensical.

Gulacy does a fine job with everything. Davis continues to be a good inker for him. It’s too bad there wasn’t much to do. The monstrous aspects of the Thing are sort of tame in the comic book form. Without slime, it just doesn’t work.

It’s also unfortunate de Vries ran out of ideas and did yet another blood test with the flamethrower and the dishes. He moves the action to an anchored ship and rapidly repeats the same tropes.

The finale’s a disappointment. It seemed to be improving….

CREDITS

Writer, David de Vries; penciller, Paul Gulacy; inker, Dan Davis; colorist, Matthew Hollingsworth; letterer, Steve Haynie; editors, Randy Stradley and Bob Cooper; publisher, Dark Horse Comics.

For someone who really likes explaining things, de Vries doesn’t go into how MacReady has become an international Thing hunter.

But while his presence is narratively ludicrous, de Vries uses the character well. Oh, there’s some lame dialogue, but the issue’s sort of good. de Vries cuts back a little on how the Thing operates and behaves, but only on the telling part. He still shows this one Thing spread its control over a town. The problem is with the infected having autonomy. It doesn’t fit with the movie, or even the previous comic books. Instead, it’s Body Snatchers with tentacles.

But sort of good.

Gulacy is a fine asset on the book—he brings some professionalism to it, but it’s still a difficult plot to visualize. The Thing in a small fishing town. It’s not a particularly interesting setting.

As a mix of action, suspense and horror, it works.

CREDITS

Writer, David de Vries; penciller, Paul Gulacy; inker, Dan Davis; colorist, Matthew Hollingsworth; letterer, Steve Haynie; editors, Randy Stradley and Bob Cooper; publisher, Dark Horse Comics.

Turns out de Vries has the reverse problem of John Arcudi on The Thing. de Vries is better with MacReady around.

MacReady shows up—in a private helicopter, in sunglasses and maybe with a laser gun. Gulacy loves sunglasses. They make no sense in the context and it’s not particularly good art, but it’s an amusing misfire.

All the exposition about the Thing’s society and purpose is somewhat interesting. de Vries decides each creature makes a little society for itself, never letting a piece get more important than it. It’s probably laying groundwork for a Thing to team up with MacReady so who cares…

But at least de Vries is thinking.

It’s a shame this information is presented to the reader in goofy narration or bad expository dialogue.

Oh, and I was mistaken before, it takes place in New Zealand, not Australia.

Hopefully it’ll get scary soon; it’s not now.

CREDITS

Writer, David de Vries; penciller, Paul Gulacy; inker, Dan Davis; colorist, Matthew Hollingsworth; letterer, Steve Haynie; editors, Randy Stradley and Bob Cooper; publisher, Dark Horse Comics.

Eternal Vows is the Thing comic I had expected from Dark Horse. Not a direct sequel to the movie, but some lame story set in the “same universe.”

David de Vries sets this one in Australia (presumably because it’s close to the Antarctic location of the movie, but he doesn’t explain) and it’s a murder mystery in a small fishing town. Or dock town. Something.

It’s Paul Gulacy on pencils and Dan Davis does a fine enough job inking him. This art is Gulacy-lite, a little earlier than I’m used to seeing it, but it’s still competent enough Gulacy.

What de Vries does though, in an amazing move, is give the “Thing” thoughts. He apparently didn’t realize if you go into the mind of the monster, you get the converted from Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Besides the gross out horror, de Vries totally misses the point.

It’s bewildering.

CREDITS

Writer, David de Vries; penciller, Paul Gulacy; inker, Dan Davis; colorist, Matthew Hollingsworth; letterer, Steve Haynie; editors, Randy Stradley and Bob Cooper; publisher, Dark Horse Comics.