My Rating
“Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein”
Night began to fall on the Artic tundra as Captain Robert Walton IV pushed his crew further towards their Schooner. The ship had become landlocked in the ice one week prior as heavy storms passed through the region. It mattered little though. The captain and his crew were close to their objective. They assembled several teams of diggers and set out on foot over the frozen waters. There were still five miles to cover.
Two days passed and the fruits of their labor blossomed. They had found the monster! Frozen in a block of ice for over 100 years, Captain Walton had done what his great grandfather could not. Robert had recovered the legendary Frankenstein monster.
The exhausted crew began a mutiny on the second day. They blamed the monster for their recent misfortunes. The truth was they were all frightened of the creature. Even though the chipped ice, the monster’s features were grizzly at best. Captain Walton’s faithful Eskimo Porter, Canute, jumped into action to quell the uprising. The men finally agreed to load the monster on board their ship.
The ice broke three days later and the Schooner sailed again. In the Captain’s quarters Robert Walton settled in for the evening with a stiff drink in his hand. To pass the time he began telling his first mate the history of Victor Von Frankenstein.
Will one ill-placed oil lamp cause a meltdown in two senses of the word? Where does Doctor Frankenstein get all of those wonderful toys? Can you create a monster without the traditional lightning strike? Collect the series to find out!
Reviewer Notes
We have Ploog! Yes, this is issue one in Marvel’s 1972 adaptation of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein novel. Ploog does the art, and I’m loving it so far. Not many can say they drew Frankenstein, Werewolves, and Man-Things.
The only thing I didn’t care for, so far, was the old school layout of the panels. I’m not sure if this was standard practice for that time, but Ploog stuck with the blocky panel layout for some reason. It would have been nice to see more variations in the page layout.
As for the writing, I covered Gary Friedrich in my review of the Atlas Comics “Fright, Featuring the Son of Dracula”. Gary does a wonderful job taking elements from Mary Shelley’s work and using them as the prelude to this comic. In this adaptation, Gary has the Monster survive death and become encased in a block of ice. Only time will tell if the monster becomes a good guy or villain. I’m giving the issue four stars.
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