IDW Tales From the Darkside #1: A Review

Written by Joe Hill

Art by Gabriel Rodriguez

Famed horror writer Joe Hill had made quite the name for himself over the past several years. You probably know Joe from his novels Heart Shaped Box And Horns. The latter of which was made into a major motion picture. Joe was in the works to reboot George Romero’s Tales from the Darkside television series until the CW backed out. After that Joe decided to change mediums and brought the idea to IDW who quickly approved the project. Tales from the Darkside is intended as a four issue series starting with the short story “The Sleepwalker”.

In “The Sleepwalker” we first meet our main character Ziggy as he’s explaining how he came to have the perfect summer life. By day he’s a lifeguard at the community pool, and at night he throws wild parties at his mother’s house. His mother is conveniently out of town for the summer on business. Life of course wasn’t always so sweet. Prior to this summer, Ziggy was at risk of failing, due to his habit of oversleeping. So his teacher gave him an ultimatum: either help fellow student Maddy win the Shakespeare scholarship or fail to graduate. Seeing no other option Ziggy helps Maddy get the scholarship and builds a friendship with the girl in the process. A friendship that would shatter when she came back to find him turned into a party animal. Snap back to the present and we see Ziggy falling asleep while on lifeguard duty. An act that results in the death of a swimmer at the pool. Ziggy gets off with no charges, thanks to his mother’s connections, but suddenly finds himself without a job or friends.

Feeling depressed Ziggy is no longer the person who oversleeps all the time. In fact he’s having trouble sleeping at all. After being sequestered in his house for days, Ziggy decides to take a walk around his neighborhood. Seeing people still living their everyday lives feels strange to him and then out of nowhere time suddenly stops. Except for Ziggy and a mysterious stranger, all the people are frozen in place. The stranger yells Ziggy he is stuck in a dark moment before disappearing leaving Ziggy confused. When tune starts back up Ziggy discovers that a glance at his face causes anyone to immediately fall asleep. Feeling he’s been cursed he calls on his old friend Maddy for emotional support. She doesn’t believe him until she experienced the phenomenon herself. Only waking to find Ziggy wearing his old theater mask, the frowny face half of the comedy/drama symbol, to protect people from his stare.

With this issue Joe Hill had once again proved that he is quite the skilled story teller. Not surprising coming from the son of Stephen King(a little info tidbit for you). Given the morbid nature of the story I can see why the CW passed this up as a show, but I am shocked no other networks picked it up. Yet, I’m happy they didn’t otherwise I wouldn’t get to read this comic.

Of course this comic wouldn’t have been possible if not for the award winning talent of artist Gabriel Rodriguez. The combination of Hills’ suspenseful writing paired with Rodriguez’s realism fit together like a two puzzle pieces. This is the second collaboration these two have worked on together, and if they’re history holds up this might just be another award winning series. I’m glad to see a horror related title on the shelves of comic shops again, and I hope this is a gateway for more to come out.