Vampirella 7 kicked off a story arc where the title vampire had to work alongside The Cabal to stop a plague from destroying mankind. The plague spreads like a super contagious virus, causing people to spit out black goo and attack anyone who didn’t have the plague until they were either infected or killed. It’s a pretty intense story arc, and it concludes with today’s Vampirella 11.
One thing that’s great about Nancy A. Collins’s Vampirella run is how it borrows from various mythologies, expands on them and ties it directly with the main story. The plague is created by the accursed, a small group of people cursed with immortality as punishment for their crimes. Issues 8 and 9 dealt with Faust, an alchemist, and Medea, a sorceress in turn. The last two both dealt with Cain, who according to the bible, was humanity’s very first murderer.
This comic takes the biblical story and expands on the myth, not only cursing Cain with immortality, but he can only sire twins … who always end up murdering each other by a certain age. This curse even extends to Vampirella, whose older twin, Draculina, was revealed in Vampirella: Feary Tales 5. It’s kind of amazing how Collins’s run is starting to fit together, and how each of the Accursed contributed to the plague in their own way. There isn’t much action in this issue, although the fight between Vampirella and Draculina is brutal. Most of this comic focuses on tying everything together, and that’s what makes this comic so satisfying.
The art by Patrick Berkenkotter is good. Even with their opposite-coloured hair and different expressions, Vampirella and Draculina appear very similar. Most of the backgrounds are simple, which makes sense since the modern setting takes place in a barn and most of the flashback takes place in fields or are close-ups of Cain’s children murdering each other, but they do a good job at enhancing the mood. When the vampire twins fight, there’s a good amount of debris flying around. The injuries they give each other remain until the end.
This arc is mostly a straight horror story, with this issue having the only real vampire fight, but it’s a good arc. Each issue has some sort of interesting mythology going on, but this one ties everything together in a surprisingly simple way. I’m not entirely sure if I’m going to keep reading this series, but after this issue, it’s more likely a yes than a no. Either way, this is worth checking out for any fans of horror comics.
My favourite comic of the week is between this and Angela: Asgard’s Assassin 5.
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