Shokki [II] tekijänä Richard Corben #2

Hard Bound. No dust jacket. Color restoration by José Villarrubia. B&W restoration, color cover restoration, and digital production by Ryan Jorgensen. [id] Reprints all Richard Corben comic stories from Creepy & Eerie. Similar print as Creepy Presents Richard Corben (2012), except this version in two parts.

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Shokki [II] tekijänä Richard Corben #2 – Review

March 19, 2014. €27.00. 176[+8] pgs.

The second volume of the stories made by Richard Corben for Warren is showing masterpieces never printed in Finnish before. The solo exception for that is B&W The Oval Portarit! (in Finnish “Soikea muotokuva”). It was printed in Shokki Juhla-albumi in 2012. A fine story indeed.

Volume 2 introduces for us several Bruce Jones’ stories which were remarkable writings in Warren legacy. A time travel trilogy is Earth shaking. It contains stories Within You… Without You (“Sinussa… sinutta”), Time and Time Again (“Aika on aikaa”), and Years & Mind Forever (“Vuodet & mieli ikuisesti”).

Richard Corben adores to draw dinosaurs. In this story Bruce Jones brings us to time when human kind was born. Ten years later Bruce Jones and Richard Corben collaborated with the same theme in a book lenght story called Rip in Time (1987).

In the trilogy we’ll meet a character who looks exactly like Bruce Jones himself. That is not unusual since Richard Corben draws his friends into his stories freqently. Alas the female character is actually a friend of Bruce’s and Richard’s. Karen Gilbertson.

You can find Bruce and Karen from the story In Deep (“Syvissä vesissä”) which is also in this volume. Among other stories Bruce and Karen acted in live action video The Dark Planet (1989) which was a collection of fantasy and action videos Richard Corben used to shoot with his friends.

Bruce Jones wrote two more nice stories for Warren, You’re a Big Girl Now (“Oletpa sinä iso tyttö jo”), and A Woman Scorned (“Petetty nainen”). The first one is ingeniously crocked 20 Feet Woman meets King Kong theme story.

Other brilliant stories in the book are three Edgar Allan Poe adaptations. The Oval Portrait! I alreadly mentions, but there exists, too, Raven (“Korppi”) and Shadow (“Varjo”). Shadow was originally printed in B&W but here José Villarrubia restored it in full color, the version which was printed only ten years later in Edgar Allan Poe (1985) collection book.

Richard Corben has made several Edgar Allan Poe adaptations. In Warren publications all adaptations were serious horror stories. For Marvel he made a humorous Max Comics version, Haunt of Horror: Edgar Allan Poe (2006), and recent more free but serious Dark Horse versions.

The book contains also Introduction by José Villarrubia and Restoration notes by José Villarrubia and Ryan Jorgensen. Pay attention on thanks for MuutaNet. The end of the book has got a cover gallery of eight Creepy and Eerie covers. They are the rest covers you cannot find from the volume one. The painting in the very end of the book is the original Creepy presents Richard Corben (2012) front cover. In Finnish version both covers (volume one and two) are originally made for Dark Horse Presents during Richard Corben‘s major, recnet Edgar Allan Poe adaptations.

Together Shokki books (volume one and two) cover all Warren Creepy and Eerie stories. There exists also four Vampirella stories excluded from this edition. “As Though They Were Living!”, “The Woodlik Inheritance!”, “Top to Bottom”, and “Metifa!” The last one was a pager, Vampi’s Feary Tales shortie. Additionally Richard Corben made a full feature scifi story, “Mutant World” which was printed in 1989. Warren printed many Richard Corben stories in their collection publicantion called Comix International.

Corben renew comic scene and build an entire new area for Warren comics: colors. He made several own stories in color and colored several other stories for Warren publications. About half of Shokki stories are in color.

Shokki edition’s got one unique exception no other print around the world has. Jan Strnad wrote a story called Bowser (“Musti”). The first two pages of the story has been printed always in different order than in Finnish version. The title page has always been on page one (in every Warren prints and later reprints), but in Finnish version the title page is now page two! And actually the story’s got more sense in that way. The boy feeds his pet with a puppy and says on the title page’s first frame, “Gettin’ hard t’ find strays in this neighbourhood–“. The end of the title page boy is leaving the cellar saying, “–I’ll be back later for your walk.” On page three boy slams the door and leaves a pet alone.

Post Scriptum/Feb. 18th, 2017: As a matter of fact, Jan Strnad, the auther of the story, approved (Facebook Feb. 6th, 2017) that the Finnish order of the pages is the way the story was intented to be! So, the Finnish print is the only existing version where Bowser is printed in right way!

– SidSid Keränen