Tag: Stephen R. Bissette

Dark Horse Presents (1986) #143

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It’s Yeates and Bissette doing a Tarzan issue… how bad can it be?

Not at all; it can’t be bad.

The story is split into three parts–the first features Tarzan exploring the Hollow Earth and thinking about his life, before he runs into some cannibals. Well, are they cannibals if they only eat other humanoids? They also eat each other. So they are cannibals. It’s an amusing buildup to that revelation.

The second part mostly has to do with Tarzan journeying with a Hollow Earth native. She’s trying to find a mythical island. This part is from her perspective so it’s never clear why Tarzan’s hanging out with her.

The final part, scripted by Bissette, is more action oriented. Tarzan goes into the Hollow Earth underworld and finds a malevolent tribe of creatures.

Beautiful artwork–it’s very strong overall.

Now I want to read more of Yeates’s Tarzan work.

Dark Horse Presents (1986) #37

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Thank goodness there’s a Bacchus in here because otherwise it’d be a complete loss.

Guinan’s art continues to be acceptable on Heartbreakers, while he and Bennett’s writing just gets worse and worse. Some of the issue is with them trying to do too much in such a short amount of pages… But mostly they just can’t write it. They can’t make their characters matter, so they try to make their ideas matter. Except it’s a bunch of theoretical ideas, so… as usual… who cares?

Speaking of bad, Davis is now changing the hairstyles for the protagonists between panels on Celia & Delia. This installment has a lot of exposition and very little action or even implied action. It’s a complete bore.

The Bacchus story is dark and confusing, but absolutely wonderful. Campbell and Bissette confound with purpose. Reading it–they’re adapting a poem–can be time consuming, but very worth it.

Dark Horse Presents 37 (March 1990)

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Thank goodness there’s a Bacchus in here because otherwise it’d be a complete loss.

Guinan’s art continues to be acceptable on Heartbreakers, while he and Bennett’s writing just gets worse and worse. Some of the issue is with them trying to do too much in such a short amount of pages… But mostly they just can’t write it. They can’t make their characters matter, so they try to make their ideas matter. Except it’s a bunch of theoretical ideas, so… as usual… who cares?

Speaking of bad, Davis is now changing the hairstyles for the protagonists between panels on Celia & Delia. This installment has a lot of exposition and very little action or even implied action. It’s a complete bore.

The Bacchus story is dark and confusing, but absolutely wonderful. Campbell and Bissette confound with purpose. Reading it–they’re adapting a poem–can be time consuming, but very worth it.

CREDITS

Heartbreakers, The Crowd Roars; story by Anina Bennett and Paul Guinan; art by Guinan; lettering by Willie Schubert. Delia & Celia, Gratitude; story, art and lettering by Gary Davis. Bacchus, Tam O’Shanter; story and art by Eddie Campbell and Stephen R. Bissette. Edited by Randy Stradley.