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Darkhold: Pages from the Book of Sins #1-16
DARKHOLD: PAGES FROM THE BOOK OF SINS - THE COMPLETE COLLECTION
Once you get your hands on the Darkhold, you'll be dying to read what's inside! And when long-lost pages of the Book of Sins begin to resurface, cursing those who read them with vicious twists on their greatest desires, it's up to Victoria Montesi and her Darkhold Redeemers, Sam Buchanan and Louise Hastings, to keep them out of the wrong hands! As the mysterious Darkhold Dwarf spreads chaos and the powerful pages wreak havoc, the Redeemers get a little help from Doctor Strange, Ghost Rider and their fellow Midnight Sons - but whose side is Modred the Mystic on? With demonic forces on the rise, can the Redeemers prevent the rebirth of Chthon? COLLECTING: DARKHOLD: PAGES FROM THE BOOK OF SINS 1-16; DOCTOR STRANGE, SORCERER SUPREME 90; MATERIAL FROM MIDNIGHT SONS UNLIMITED 1-2; MARVEL COMICS PRESENTS (1988) 145
464 pages, Paperback
First published November 26, 2018
7 people are currently reading
74 people want to read
About the author
Christian Cooper
15 books142 followers Christian Cooper is a science and comics writer and editor and the host and consulting producer of Extraordinary Birder on National Geographic. One of Marvel’s first openly gay writers and editors, Cooper introduced the first gay male character in Star Trek, in the Starfleet Academy series, which was nominated for a GLAAD Media Award. He also introduced the first openly lesbian character for Marvel and created and authored Queer Nation: The Online Gay Comic. Based in New York City, he is on the board of directors for NYC Audubon.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
January 15, 2023
this series definitely has it’s ups and downs (mainly downs lol), but it was all the while entertaining. although i know that this comic is not meant for everyone, if you still choose to read on, it’ll keep you occupied for a good while :)
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January 17, 2022Nowadays Christian Cooper is probably better known for an absolute arsehole trying to get him arrested, or worse, while he was peacefully trying to birdwatch than he is for his work in comics. But he was an editor at Marvel back in the day, and sometimes a writer too, including on this very odd series, probably best remembered for introducing the company's first officially lesbian character, Vicki Montesi. Reading it, though, she wasn't the character who struck me as remarkable. These days, comics have plenty of young, attractive queer leads with dark secrets. What they're still short on is the likes of Louise Hastings, Barbados-born Oxford professor. A grandma you'd never describe as grandmotherly; a substantial woman whose age is no barrier to her fondly reminiscing about her string of ex-husbands, and who can still look after herself, most impressively when she slows Sabretooth down with a point-blank shotgun blast to the junk. Probably the closest comparison would be Amanda Waller at DC (and not the far more glamorous screen version), but the Wall buys that sense of being a serious customer at the cost of being damaged, dangerous, broken. Whereas Hastings is a character with whom you absolutely would not fuck, but whom it would be an absolute hoot to run into.
Oh, and there's also Samson Buchanan, but he's less interesting. Interpol agent, the muscle of the group, and also its Scully. Despite the fact that this series began a year before X-Files. After Twin Peaks, mind, which it's blatantly referencing with its opening page, where a dwarf stands on a black and white checked floor, offering terrible occult secrets. Which do, however, unfold in a very X-Files case of the week fashion, each time kicking off some manner of supernatural horridness which the team shut down and which Buchanan, despite direct involvement, despite living on Marvel Earth for heavens' sake, spends far longer than is remotely sane insisting is just hallucination or trickery or some bloody thing. The man's an arse. But yes, nineties reference points. The important thing to bear in mind here is that this is an incredibly nineties comic. Now, that can mean nineties a la Vertigo, dark and mature and spooky, addressing the issues of the day as horror comics were only just remembering they could. Or it can mean nineties in the sense of early Image, bulging muscles and enormous guns and all that. And the remarkable thing about Darkhold is, it's both. Stories of toxic masculinity or police brutality breeding monsters are straight out of the post-Swamp Thing rebirth of horror comics...and then some goon with improbably broad shoulders, an overly detailed leather jacket, and/or a firearm which has never heard of physics will barge in. At times, it doesn't work at all; there's one issue which forms part of some forgotten crossover where Blade had gone wrong, declared war on all things supernatural, and acquired a Venom-esque tongue while also combining powers like a knock-off Onslaught, all under the name Switchblade. It consists mostly of characters looking constipated at each other, and is really quite bad. But then the interactions with the wider Marvel universe often feel the least surely handled bits of the story – see also the issue where we get the whole 'heroes mistake each other for the villains and initially fight' go-round, twice, which is at least once more than I can forgive. When it's off doing its own thing, though, more often than not it comes off. Even at times when it really shouldn't, as with the issue which lets recurring annoyance Modred the Mystic take the lead for a metaphysical variant on the old capture/escape/recapture bit. It even flags up its own utter pointlessness in plot terms: "Isn't the emptiness exquisite? We thought you might enjoy that futile little escapade." And yet in a book about the powers of darkness, that makes perfect sense as a glimpse of what Hell must be like. There are ghastly creatures lurking, unsuspected and Asphyx-like, within us all; there are temptations to make even the strongest take a step into the dark. There's a spell for immortality as a swarm of worms, which, yes, is stolen straight from Lovecraft (just as the Darkhold itself is clearly the Necronomicon with the title page hastily substituted, and its creator Chthon is Marvel's own-brand Cthulhu), but was also spookily appropriate given the reason I'd started reading this was a Boxing Day joke suggesting the sins of the title were the same as those in the 'Worm off the string, what sins will he commit?' meme. So yes, sometimes it may lapse from Darkhold into Darkplace:
"Caprice? Is it gone? Can't see...blood in my eyes...just let me wipe the blood off. Oh, thanks for the towel."
"That's no towel – it's your face."
Yes, it does have a scene featuring Doctor Strange in short shorts. Yes, the art is wildly inconsistent, and some of it is by a man whose own damnation was to be named Norman Felchle (though elsewhere we get the likes of Mark Buckingham, Joe Quesada, Tony Harris, and probably the closest thing to a regular artist is Doom Patrol's Richard Case). And yes, it's hard not to feel the piss is being taken when you read something called the Complete Collection, and the cover of the first issue it contains is badged 'Part 4 of 6', and then the finale is also two chapters of a 12 (or more?)-part crossover, before the story (with some major developments skipped) resolves in an issue of another comic entirely, by a different creative team, which can't spell 'Montesi'. But this is always at least historically interesting, and often a pretty effective horror comic.
Oh, and there's also Samson Buchanan, but he's less interesting. Interpol agent, the muscle of the group, and also its Scully. Despite the fact that this series began a year before X-Files. After Twin Peaks, mind, which it's blatantly referencing with its opening page, where a dwarf stands on a black and white checked floor, offering terrible occult secrets. Which do, however, unfold in a very X-Files case of the week fashion, each time kicking off some manner of supernatural horridness which the team shut down and which Buchanan, despite direct involvement, despite living on Marvel Earth for heavens' sake, spends far longer than is remotely sane insisting is just hallucination or trickery or some bloody thing. The man's an arse. But yes, nineties reference points. The important thing to bear in mind here is that this is an incredibly nineties comic. Now, that can mean nineties a la Vertigo, dark and mature and spooky, addressing the issues of the day as horror comics were only just remembering they could. Or it can mean nineties in the sense of early Image, bulging muscles and enormous guns and all that. And the remarkable thing about Darkhold is, it's both. Stories of toxic masculinity or police brutality breeding monsters are straight out of the post-Swamp Thing rebirth of horror comics...and then some goon with improbably broad shoulders, an overly detailed leather jacket, and/or a firearm which has never heard of physics will barge in. At times, it doesn't work at all; there's one issue which forms part of some forgotten crossover where Blade had gone wrong, declared war on all things supernatural, and acquired a Venom-esque tongue while also combining powers like a knock-off Onslaught, all under the name Switchblade. It consists mostly of characters looking constipated at each other, and is really quite bad. But then the interactions with the wider Marvel universe often feel the least surely handled bits of the story – see also the issue where we get the whole 'heroes mistake each other for the villains and initially fight' go-round, twice, which is at least once more than I can forgive. When it's off doing its own thing, though, more often than not it comes off. Even at times when it really shouldn't, as with the issue which lets recurring annoyance Modred the Mystic take the lead for a metaphysical variant on the old capture/escape/recapture bit. It even flags up its own utter pointlessness in plot terms: "Isn't the emptiness exquisite? We thought you might enjoy that futile little escapade." And yet in a book about the powers of darkness, that makes perfect sense as a glimpse of what Hell must be like. There are ghastly creatures lurking, unsuspected and Asphyx-like, within us all; there are temptations to make even the strongest take a step into the dark. There's a spell for immortality as a swarm of worms, which, yes, is stolen straight from Lovecraft (just as the Darkhold itself is clearly the Necronomicon with the title page hastily substituted, and its creator Chthon is Marvel's own-brand Cthulhu), but was also spookily appropriate given the reason I'd started reading this was a Boxing Day joke suggesting the sins of the title were the same as those in the 'Worm off the string, what sins will he commit?' meme. So yes, sometimes it may lapse from Darkhold into Darkplace:
"Caprice? Is it gone? Can't see...blood in my eyes...just let me wipe the blood off. Oh, thanks for the towel."
"That's no towel – it's your face."
Yes, it does have a scene featuring Doctor Strange in short shorts. Yes, the art is wildly inconsistent, and some of it is by a man whose own damnation was to be named Norman Felchle (though elsewhere we get the likes of Mark Buckingham, Joe Quesada, Tony Harris, and probably the closest thing to a regular artist is Doom Patrol's Richard Case). And yes, it's hard not to feel the piss is being taken when you read something called the Complete Collection, and the cover of the first issue it contains is badged 'Part 4 of 6', and then the finale is also two chapters of a 12 (or more?)-part crossover, before the story (with some major developments skipped) resolves in an issue of another comic entirely, by a different creative team, which can't spell 'Montesi'. But this is always at least historically interesting, and often a pretty effective horror comic.
June 15, 2021
This books starts off really well with an interesting concept. The Darkhold pages are disappearing and ordinary folks are getting them and unwittingly unleashing demons onto the earth. This isn’t a job for Dr Strange or Ghost Rider, but three normal folks because their ordinariness gives them a unique perspective on magical things.
Really interesting concept for a case of the month type comic. The art from Richard Case and Tony Harris were also great for the first half of the series with some genuinely terrifying demon designs. After that though the series kind of falls apart. Plagued by crossovers, constant changing artists, and inconsistencies with the characters motivations made an once interesting viewpoint rarely seen in mainstream comics (what it’s like being a normal person in the Marvel Universe) into a generic 90s action comic. The character of Buchanan being the most egregious as he comically becomes more and more muscular by the end of the series.
I really thought I had stumbled on a forgotten gem reading the first five or six issues and then became really disappointed when the book seemed to have lost its vision in the second half. It definitely feels like editorial interference because it had the same writer for the entire series, but I could be wrong about that. Would love to see this concept tackled again in modern comics. Still seems like an idea ripe with potential.
Really interesting concept for a case of the month type comic. The art from Richard Case and Tony Harris were also great for the first half of the series with some genuinely terrifying demon designs. After that though the series kind of falls apart. Plagued by crossovers, constant changing artists, and inconsistencies with the characters motivations made an once interesting viewpoint rarely seen in mainstream comics (what it’s like being a normal person in the Marvel Universe) into a generic 90s action comic. The character of Buchanan being the most egregious as he comically becomes more and more muscular by the end of the series.
I really thought I had stumbled on a forgotten gem reading the first five or six issues and then became really disappointed when the book seemed to have lost its vision in the second half. It definitely feels like editorial interference because it had the same writer for the entire series, but I could be wrong about that. Would love to see this concept tackled again in modern comics. Still seems like an idea ripe with potential.
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October 10, 2022Not complete
Calling this "The Complete Collection" is a bad joke. There are at least two crossovers in this volume that are incomplete. Because only the Dark hold issues are included, it's impossible to follow these crossovers. And as most of the Midnight Sons line remains UNCOLLECTED, it's impossible to read those full crossovers without hunting down back issues or resorting to piracy.
Do better, Marvel.
Calling this "The Complete Collection" is a bad joke. There are at least two crossovers in this volume that are incomplete. Because only the Dark hold issues are included, it's impossible to follow these crossovers. And as most of the Midnight Sons line remains UNCOLLECTED, it's impossible to read those full crossovers without hunting down back issues or resorting to piracy.
Do better, Marvel.
March 15, 2024
Tra le serie nate e sviluppate sulla scia del successo del Ghost Rider di Mackie, questa era giudicata la più debole e la prima a chiudere. In effetti fu così, durò giusto 16 numeri e chiuse con il cross-over Siege of Darkness.
Era una serie senza un personaggio di punta valido, perché Modred il Mistico non lo è mai stato, men che meno con questo look da sfigato drogato. Victoria Montesi era un personaggio interessante ma come comprimaria, non come protagonista. Gli altri, tutti dimenticabili.
I disegni, a parte un numero di Tony Harris, sono pessimi, sempre.
La storia che Cooper imbastisce è complessa e confusa, anche a causa dei continui riferimenti alle altre testate di questa sottofamiglia.
Eppure c'era del buono. C'erano buone idee, praticamente in quasi tutti i numeri. C'era una certa atmosfera horror che tutto sommato mancava nelle altre serie, perché al massimo Morbius è gore e splatter; Nightstalkers comunque è super eroistica così come Ghost e Spirits of Vengeance.
Quindi non basterebbe per far guadagnare le 2 stelle a questo volume.
Le raggiunge perché in coda ristampa l'ultimo numero di Dr. Strange dove la sottotrama di Victoria, lasciata in sospeso, viene chiusa.
Peccato, perché per lo più questa serie è stata una occasione sprecata.
Era una serie senza un personaggio di punta valido, perché Modred il Mistico non lo è mai stato, men che meno con questo look da sfigato drogato. Victoria Montesi era un personaggio interessante ma come comprimaria, non come protagonista. Gli altri, tutti dimenticabili.
I disegni, a parte un numero di Tony Harris, sono pessimi, sempre.
La storia che Cooper imbastisce è complessa e confusa, anche a causa dei continui riferimenti alle altre testate di questa sottofamiglia.
Eppure c'era del buono. C'erano buone idee, praticamente in quasi tutti i numeri. C'era una certa atmosfera horror che tutto sommato mancava nelle altre serie, perché al massimo Morbius è gore e splatter; Nightstalkers comunque è super eroistica così come Ghost e Spirits of Vengeance.
Quindi non basterebbe per far guadagnare le 2 stelle a questo volume.
Le raggiunge perché in coda ristampa l'ultimo numero di Dr. Strange dove la sottotrama di Victoria, lasciata in sospeso, viene chiusa.
Peccato, perché per lo più questa serie è stata una occasione sprecata.
December 23, 2021
This collection is a showcase of "almost there" in everything. This was a mid 90s comic that tried to be horror, but within a comic code. It tried to be LGBTQ+ friendly before that was a thing, so every instance is muted or an aside. They tried to take a decent amount of mid tier mystical characters and give them a X-files type purpose...but not quite.
It's ok. It doesn't tick any of the boxes that would make it a classic
It's ok. It doesn't tick any of the boxes that would make it a classic
October 8, 2021
Try as I might, I can't put a finger on what it was about Darkhold: Pages From the Book of Sins—The Complete Collection that didn't grab me. It's not the art, necessarily; as it was on Doom Patrol, Richard Case's artwork is matched quite well to the source material, and even the fill-ins, especially that by a pre-Starman and -Ex Machina Tony Harris, are alternatively also appropriate for the source material or beautiful to look at or a combination of both. It's not the characters in the book, although lead character Victoria Montesi's LGBTQ+ identity is oblique at best (not to mention that her partner is killed off reeeeeeeaaaaaal early in the narrative), and even though I could very much do without the fact that another little person in Big Two comics is presented as degenerate, evil, or both. (It's telling that for many, many years, if not to the very present, all little people in DC Comics—whether Pip the Troll, Doctor Psycho, or the Teen Titans villain Gizmo, they almost all fit into this category; I mean, Eugene "Puck" Judd was a notable exception to the rule…until Bill Mantlo retconned away his until-then-canonical little person status immediately! after John Byrne's run on Alpha Flight…but I digress.) It's not Chris Cooper's writing, either; Cooper is adept, and does his utmost best with what he's given (again, not to mention that in other Marvel books by Cooper, he does a much better job than this), but when editorial seems to have insisted that every single hot-in-the-1990s character (the Punisher, anyone?) be shoehorned into the book (even if Marvel's Midnight Sons imprint was very much a celebration of the 30th anniversary of Ghost Rider and co.) there's only so much the writers can do. (Also, as someone else on Goodreads mentioned, the black-and-white story "From the Light, Darkness" by Cooper and Joe Quesada and Jimmy Palmiotti on art is nothing short of a masterpiece.)
I guess I kind of answered my own question from the beginning of the review; while no one aspect in particular makes Darkhold: Pages from the Book of Sins an misfire, however admirable (albeit not an outright failure), it's the perfect shitstorm of misfires in miniature that produces the overall disappointing effect. I mean, I can see almost every last bit of merit in Darkhold—one of the first non-stereotypical LGBTQ+ characters in the pages of Marvel Comics, interesting use of Marvel's stable of supernatural heroes, reasonably effective artwork, etc. etc. But there are too many arguably unnecessary elements thrown in, kitchen-sink, style, to Guarantee™ a hit for Marvel. It's one thing when Howard Mackie revamps the entire slate of supernatural heroes, and is the primary player in the sandbox. However, Darkhold has juuuuuuuust enough hints of Editorial Interference™ that I couldn't get behind the entire endeavor. Maybe if Marvel had let Cooper do his thing and indulge the most preposterous aspects of the Midnight Sons, Darkhold would be a better book, but as it is, it's depressingly disappointing.
I guess I kind of answered my own question from the beginning of the review; while no one aspect in particular makes Darkhold: Pages from the Book of Sins an misfire, however admirable (albeit not an outright failure), it's the perfect shitstorm of misfires in miniature that produces the overall disappointing effect. I mean, I can see almost every last bit of merit in Darkhold—one of the first non-stereotypical LGBTQ+ characters in the pages of Marvel Comics, interesting use of Marvel's stable of supernatural heroes, reasonably effective artwork, etc. etc. But there are too many arguably unnecessary elements thrown in, kitchen-sink, style, to Guarantee™ a hit for Marvel. It's one thing when Howard Mackie revamps the entire slate of supernatural heroes, and is the primary player in the sandbox. However, Darkhold has juuuuuuuust enough hints of Editorial Interference™ that I couldn't get behind the entire endeavor. Maybe if Marvel had let Cooper do his thing and indulge the most preposterous aspects of the Midnight Sons, Darkhold would be a better book, but as it is, it's depressingly disappointing.
May 28, 2020
This is how the book starts, an obviously evil midget offering someone a black envelope and promising the fulfillment of their wishes. Of course, the promise is not made in good faith and the black envelope contains nothing else than the pages from the mysterious tome of Darkhold, a book that was long ago written by the Elder God Chthon himself (or itself). The midget turns up at seemingly random places, and the pages contain nothing but chaos and suffering. The protagonists are all banded together to find the pages and try to stop whatever else is going on.
The episodic structure is set up nicely and holds for the majority of the book. We get cameos from Ghost Rider, Blade, Doctor Strange and others from Marvel's "Dark Magic" bunch. The pacing is breakneck, a couple pages of horror setup, and then it's all Pulp Cthulhu with shotguns and dynamite. They've even managed to feature the Punisher in one of the stories. Never thought that I'd read an occult Punisher story. Then again, I haven't read much of this character yet, so who knows, maybe it's not that uncommon.
The pacing is so breakneck, in fact, that sometimes just two panels and a small block of text describe significant chunks of the narrative or it's just sketched out. The most hilarious example that I can remember is when one of the four main characters leaves America for the Vatican to do occult research. In the meantime bad stuff starts happening, the other character calls her on the phone with "Doc, we have problems! We need you here!" and after some action scenes runs out from the house to find the doc emerging out of a taxi. "I got here as soon as I could!" She must've been in that Vatican bar next door instead, I guess. It wasn't that bad, but you get the gist.
I like the Modred character. An ancient sorcerer in a leather jacket that does his kungfu magic, appearing out of nowhere to either help or hinder the protagonists and staying a wild card until the very end. The magic duel between Doctor Strange and him was especially entertaining, with all these amusing poses they took to cast spells. Actually, I would like to see more of him but it doesn't look like he's featured a lot in other comics.
Unfortunately, the last issues were all part of the crossover, which was not fully included. The reader is left to guess what happens in-between with Lilith and her undead army, and that mist. The story, however, is concluded pretty nicely, with all major questions answered and evil thwarted. I haven't mentioned the art yet, and it is done by multiple artists, but it is quite amazing at times. The fans of 90s style action-horror (if that's even a thing) may find this 450 pages tome entertaining.
March 15, 2021
I picked this up entirely based on having gotten the trading card for this group in the '90s and never having heard of them otherwise. It was Halloween, and there was some Darkhold-related stuff in the MCU, so I decided I would read it. This was decidedly not my bag. It's definitely going for a horror comics vibe, and I'm generally not into that. It's also from the '90s, so it's got that extreme style, both in the art and the writing. Buchannan goes from a pretty regular guy to a giant slab of meat over the course of this really quite long trade. Despite being very long, it also featured portions of certain crossover events, but not all of those events, so particularly at the beginning and the end, you just had to accept that you missed significant portions of the story, because you never read the random Midnight Sons books. I think I happened to read a contemporary Doctor Strange book from the end, so the last story felt familiar... almost as though I had already read it. It might have just been a similar story, though. Overall, I think most readers could safely skip this. It's not exceptional, and though I now know about the characters on a random trading card from nearly three decades ago, I didn't really enjoy it much, and didn't learn a great deal about the Darkhold, either. Several of these stories were referenced in that Doctor Strange trade I read a while ago, though, and were ones I thought were particularly bonkers.
December 8, 2018
The black-and-white tale “From the Light, Darkness” — originally printed in the first edition of Midnight Sons Unlimited — is a horror comic masterpiece. It’s inclusion here in the complete collection of “Darkhold: Pages from the Books of Sins” elevates — but cannot wholly save — the rest of the material in this volume. While it is still an enjoyable read... the lows outweigh the highs, and the full potential remains unrealized.
May 9, 2019
This tome has some great ideas, a solid template for an ongoing horror anthology, involves the Midnight Sons, and is Marvel’s version of HP Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos and the Necronomicon (and that aspect is illustrated better than most any other HPL mythos tales I’ve read).
Unfortunately, mediocre art, poor storytelling, and atrocious, stilted “comic book” dialogue nearly sinks this ship.
It’s a fun read if you skip over the details and solely take in the horror story aspects.
Unfortunately, mediocre art, poor storytelling, and atrocious, stilted “comic book” dialogue nearly sinks this ship.
It’s a fun read if you skip over the details and solely take in the horror story aspects.
March 13, 2021
Si viste Wandavision y quieres ahondar en el tema de Darhold, no lo hagas en esta saga. Tiene todo lo malo de los 90.
Ciertas partes de la historia son buenas pero los diálogos y el arte la matan.
Huye.
Ciertas partes de la historia son buenas pero los diálogos y el arte la matan.
Huye.
December 28, 2019
Reread this series because I remember being obsessed with anything Midnight Sons related when I was young. It does not hold up.
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