Red Room: The Antisocial Network #4

Red Room #4

by Ed Piskor

The breakout smash hit of 2021 wraps up its debut four-issue monthly "season" with a trio of tales inspired by the great EC Comics such as Tales from the Crypt and focusing on Donna Butcher, the original Queen of the Red Rooms! "Cyclical Territory," "Pure Evil," and "Snuff Said" explore Butcher's origins in the VHS/Betamax era of torture porn before twisting into a contemporary revenge fantasy gone wrong. Another stand alone masterpiece from creator of X-Men: Grand Design and Hip Hop Family Tree! As seen on Cartoonist Kayfabe (YouTube)!

Genres: Comics, Horror

32 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 15, 2021

About the author

Ed Piskor had been cartooning professionally in print form since 2005, starting off drawing American Splendor comics written by Harvey Pekar. The duo continued working together on 2 graphic novels, Macedonia, and The Beats. Ed began self publishing Wizzywig after developing a huge interest in the history of Hacking and Phone Phreaking. 3 volumes, making up 3/4 of the full story, have been published to date.

Recently Ed had designed the characters for the new Adult Swim series, Mongo Wrestling Alliance.

Reviews

[Peter Looles · Rating 5 out of 5]

This issue of "Red Room" is structured like an EC Comic, with two interconnected stories and the crypt keeper narrating them. Both stories focus on the VHS era of Red Rooms, before the internet. The first one follows the daughter of a known Red Room victim, who is searching for revenge. The second story follows the woman who killed the father of the first story's protagonist and it shows how she got into the Red Room business. At the end, the two stories connect with each other, for a climactic ending.
I absolutely loved this issue. I haven't read any EC Comics, but I know about them and they always seemed interesting to me, so I'm glad I got to read Ed Piskor's interpretation of their structure. Both stories were very interesting and I especially liked the protagonist of the first one. The girl who lost her father is written extremely well, with a complex character, great motives and a great plan. Also, I really liked how the violence itself isn't really the focus of this issue. Furthermore, the artwork by Ed Piskor was incredible as always. The violent scenes were beautifully horrific, the character designs extremely unique and the panel layouts amazing. So far, this, alongside the first issue, are my favorite ones of the series.