The holiday season may bring presents and twinkling lights, but if you read comics, you know it also brings creative comic anthologies, like Shiver Suspenstories. Now in its second year (read my review of the first edition!), the anthology horror comic returns this week to scare up five haunting tales spanning Christmas, Hanukkah, and pagan tales of woe. It’s a strong edition of Oni’s ongoing EC Comics resurgence, complete with a reprint from 1952!
This collection kicks off with a tale titled “Eight Vengeful Nights” by Ben H. Winters and Sami Kivela. The story follows a high school boy who is bullied by several classmates. His great-uncle is visiting, and he may or may not be giving the boy ways to get back at the bullies. The story has a clever connection to a prophet, with a fun montage of revenge acts. It all builds towards a rather serious final act, though the twist is warmer and more hopeful than one might expect.
Next up is “Mistletoe” by George Northy and Dan McDaid, which may be my favorite story of the bunch. The tale opens at a bar where a young-looking man is detailing recent murders by someone who kills women if they refuse to kiss him under the mistletoe. He details the gruesome deaths, but soon his time to shine is thwarted by a bar patron who points out the killer as just some loser incel. This leads to a confrontation, and a monster concept tied to botany that you won’t want to miss. I could seriously see the concept of this tale fill an entire feature film.
Mistletoe is a dangerous thing!
Credit: Oni
“Ginger-Snapped” is next, putting a horror twist on gingerbread cookies in a tale by Melissa Flores and Leomacs. The art in this story is highly detailed, opening with a gorgeous gingerbread house. An old woman seems to love her little house, which is filled with ginger cookie people. Soon, however, her little ginger house crumbles due to the loud and annoying neighbors. She gets to baking new cookies, and we soon learn there’s more to her cookies than meets the eye. It’s a rather simple, but effective little yarn.
David H. Booher and Lukas Ketner are next up for the final new story titled “Red Season.” This story focuses on a drunk jerk who plays Santa at the mall. A clever montage of his terrible interaction with kids, set to pictures, pays off later, after he gets his just deserts. A well-drawn tale, this is a story that’s more about the creatures in the end, and the final few pages. A little slow, it packs a punch in the end.
Closing out the collection is “The Execution” by Johnny Craig, a reprint of a 1952 tale with restored and remastered art by Michael Atiyeh. The dense, verbose classic style is alive and well, with a story about a man on death row. This tale is quite good at hammering home the utter horror of having a tickling clock on your life, with a surprise twist to close it out.
Shiver SuspenStories Holiday Special #2 is an inventive, unsettling, and occasionally surprisingly heartfelt anthology that proves Oni’s EC revival is firing on all cylinders. With standout entries like the brilliantly twisted “Mistletoe” and a beautifully restored 1952 reprint, this year’s edition delivers a holiday horror lineup well worth unwrapping.
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