Beware The Spaceman

Tag: Retro horror

  • Scream (1984): Not for the Nervous, or the Publisher

    Comic panel with title

    Earlier this month we took a look at classic horror comic Misty. Tonight we look at another British horror anthology comic, Scream. Its original run was only 15 issues in 1984 — a weekly title, the first of which even came with those plastic vampire teeth.

    I can imagine that being a selling point back then. Because in the eighties, fake teeth and a bin liner would make a decent enough Halloween costume. I digress.

    At the time of writing I’m five issues in. Unlike the Misty collection, these issues are in their original form, not collected. Each issue offers a new chapter continuing from the one before.

    Much like any anthology, there’s a lot to like and a lot that wasn’t for me. The strongest story so far is The Thirteenth Floor. It plays on those superstitions around the number 13 (as the recent American Horror Story series has). Maxwell is the computer in charge of Maxwell Towers. The AI goes rogue (well, didn’t that age well?) and Max will protect his — I guess — residents at any cost. The stories so far (a thief in one, a school bully in another) end with the culprit trapped on the building’s thirteenth floor, where Max has various horrors waiting for them.

    Elsewhere, The Dracula File (those teeth had to be relevant somehow) sees Dracula return to England. Rushed to a military hospital from behind the Iron Curtain, a patient riddled with bullet holes is somehow still alive. Dracula escapes the hospital and goes on a spree of terror. This one has a very “Hammer Horror” feeling about it.

    Other stories range from one where a boy’s uncle is a monster living in the basement, to one where all the cats have turned into killers.

    They’re interesting takes on monsters, and here’s where I think it differs from Misty. The fears in that comic were about being the outsider and not fitting in — school bullies, pressure, social anxiety. Scream is more about the monsters. It doesn’t shy away from that. Much like Misty, most of the stories here aren’t colourised.

    By today’s standards the stories are tame. But in 1984 IPC already had already had Mary Whitehouse on their back about their action titles in the mid 70s. Horror comics in the era of the video nasty didn’t last long. Scream’s tagline “not for the nervous” seemed to apply more to its publisher than its audience.

    What we’re left with is an interesting time capsule — a kind of “Twilight Zone” for kids. Perhaps even a predecessor to things like Are You Afraid of the Dark? or Goosebumps.

  • A Few Metres in the Dark

    Retro Reaction in ZX Spectrum colours

    We go back to the 90s now. Barry’s video shop. The back wall was dedicated to what we now know as horror icons. You know the faces: Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees, Chucky, Ghostface — and the one that both fascinated and scared me the most, Freddy Krueger.

    Of course, I couldn’t rent these movies. I was still watching Adam West’s Batman because the new films were fifteen‑plus. So for a while, Freddy remained an oversized VHS box. Older friends had seen the films, though. They were more than happy to fill me in on all the details — and the scare factor.

    “Freddy 3 is my favourite, but if you think that’s scary don’t watch Freddy 1,” was something I remember. So in my head, these films became much more frightening than they really were.

    What scared me at the time was this: unlike the other boogeymen, Freddy came for you when you were sleeping. Sooner or later, everyone has to sleep. Freddy also almost exclusively killed teenagers, and I had just become a teenager. Sad as it is, that’s where your mind goes at a young age. Being able to separate fact from fiction came later.

    Then, one night in the mid‑1990s, an older friend was “babysitting” another friend in my year. This friend had Sky Movies and wanted everyone over at his. Because it was time to meet Freddy.

    As a group of friends we laughed and talked through most of it. I remember friends who had seen that particular film jumping at various moments. Another used mock knives to make the claw sound. It was all good fun. The film that night was Part 3. It blended horror with dark fantasy and is still one of my favourites.

    Then came time to leave. My house was only a small walk — a few metres, in fact, from my friend’s. A few metres in the dark, that is.

    The babysitter looked at me, then out at the night, and sighed. “I’ll walk you home,” he said. Thankfully he didn’t add a phrase like I’ll be right back into that conversation.

    Thanks, Anthony.

    It’s October… it’s the dark month. It’s time to finally revisit Elm Street.

    Number 8: Freddy’s Revenge