Aftershock: 30 Days of Night: Dead Space June 2, 2006
Posted by HC in Aftershock Reviews, IDW.trackback
No. of issues: 3
Writer: Steve Niles & Dan Wickline
Art: Milx
Reviewer: Cavan Scott
Hack/Slash: Trailers made a very good point in its collection of mini-adventures this March – when franchises have run out of steam they blast into orbit.
With this in mind I approached 30 Days of Night: Dead Space with trepidation. Did the final frontier equal the first nail in the coffin for horrordom’s latest, and at present, greatest horror darling.
The concept is a simple one. Hours before NASA relaunches its Space Shuttle program the mission commander is converted to the vampire hordes. Once the team hit space, his vampirism hits out and floating in their tin can, high above the world, the NASA team are slaughtered one by one.
However simple the concept, you have to admit it’s a strong one. Claustrophobic location – check. Lots of mindless violence – check. Using as much red ink as you can without prompting a world shortage – check. Every box is ticked then. Well, almost.
Unlike the original 30 Days of Night I am not convinced that Dead Space would warrant many repeat visits. With three issues to build suspense and dread, writers Steve Niles and Dan Wickline choose to rush in and cut to the bloody chase. It’s an admirable tactic but one that means that the characters are mere cyphers, truly lambs to the slaughter. You don’t have the time, or indeed the inclination to form any connection with them and so hardly care when their throats are ripped out in zero G.
The real tribute of the series came in the form of Milx’s art and impressive colouring. A shame that his talent obviously wasn’t stretched by a below-par, phoned-in script.
Perhaps Hack/Slash were right after all.
SCORES: Out of 5
Art: 4
Script: 2
Chills: 2
Overall: 2
Horror Comics 
Hmmmm. Not sure I agree with you there dude. OK, this was no way near as good as the original books but sometimes horror has to be a bit one-dimensional. You don’t always need empathy as most of the 1980 slasher films showed. Sometimes all you want is a bloodbath nothing more and Deadspace certainly gave us that!
Dead Space did nothing for me at all and nothing to build up the 30 Days of Night universe. Nice idea – but not worthy oof being stretched into a mini. It would have made a good short though…
Why does it have to build up the 30 Days universe. Does everything have to be a world-changing event these days. What about story telling for story tellings sake!
[…] scene comes from 30 Days of Night: Dead Space #1 (of 3), the comic book written by Steve Niles and Dan Wickline, featuring art and colors by […]
Howdy! This post couldn’t be written much better!
Reading through this post reminds me of my previous roommate!
He constantly kept talking about this. I am going to
send this article to him. Pretty sure he’s going to have
a good read. Thanks for sharing!