DC Horror Presents… is a title I have greatly anticipated ever since it was first announced. As I’ve mentioned before on the AIPT Comics Podcast, I’m a huge fan of anthologies, and I’ve greatly enjoyed the output of the DC Horror line, going back to the release of The Conjuring: The Lover in 2021. Add on the fact that DC is coming out swinging with this new series by frontloading it with the spooktacular works of David Dastmalchian and the Boulet Brothers (all of whom have been lovely guests on the podcast), and you have my attention and my four dollars! If this sounds like a sales pitch, I apologize; it’s just that these folks operate on a wavelength that absolutely lines up with my own sensibilities. Both of these stories embrace classic pulp horror and the heightened nature of superhero storytelling, with extremely entertaining results.
The first story, “Love You to Pieces,” comes to us from the writing duo of David Dastmalchian and Leah Kilpatrick, with pencils/inks from Cat Staggs and colors by Rolumo Fajardo Jr. Readers are reintroduced to Dollhouse, the daughter of the Dollmaker who might have even more hangups than the man who raised her. We follow her in a mad dash to save a man she cares about after he meets an untimely end. Of course, when dealing with seriously messed-up villains like these, nothing is ever as it seems. The story plays out like a gnarly slasher sequence, complete with jumpscares and a twist ending worthy of classic EC Comics.
The page layouts add to this feeling, with character reactions and motions overlapping in fun ways that quickly shepherd us from beat to beat. The artwork is nasty without being overly gory, instead using clever blocking to show us just enough to know what’s happening, and leaving the rest to good old fashioned mad scientist babble. The dialogue is snappy and strangely sweet, showing us a much more family-oriented look at these characters than we’ve gotten in a while and making us almost sympathize for Dollhouse (almost). Readers who are familiar with this character might have a decent idea of where this story is going, but that didn’t stop the final page of this story from feeling like a strangely gleeful punch to the gut.
DC
The second story — written by the Boulet Brothers with pencils/inks by Butch Mapa and colors by Kristian Rossi — is much more harrowing from an emotional standpoint. Here, Wonder Woman is forced to do battle with the zombified corpse of her mother, which has been brought back with a taste for vengeance. This tale is a bit light on story, but heavy on physical and emotional damage. Mapa does an exquisite job with the character acting in this story, making Diana seem horrified, heartbroken, and genuinely frightened in equal measure. When she does what she has to do at the end of this story, her body language tells us everything we need to know: Her sense of duty and need to protect her sisters has to override everything her heart is telling her. The art and dialogue sell the impossibility of this situation, reminding us why Wonder Woman is one of the best in the superhero world.
It’s an intense, action-packed segment that gives us just about as much pathos as it does gory action. It also helps that readers will likely have more of a familiarity with WW than Dollhouse, so we don’t have to spend too much time on exposition for the emotional weight of the story to feel earned. The end of the story works both as a fun reveal for Wonder Woman fans and as a possible tease for future stories. I’ll go ahead and say it: Give the Boulet Brothers a few more issues of Wonder Woman! Let them cook!
Overall, while I would have loved a bit more breathing room for these two stories to dive deeper into the characters and their circumstances (both feel like they’re just getting going when they come to and end), I greatly enjoyed this first foray into DC Horror Presents…. It’s exciting to see these voices in the horror community being given a bigger platform through a DC Comics anthology, and it whet my zombie-like appetite for the rest of this miniseries.
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