Macbeth: A Tale of Horror

by Stefano Ascari, Simone D'Armini (Illustrator)

By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes…

Deep within the walls of Castle Dunsinane, a seed of madness begins to bloom. Spurred on by the prophesies of witches, and the whispers of his scheming wife, Lord Macbeth plots the death of his friend, King Duncan. This one cruel act soon spirals out of control, and murder after murder erupt into a wave of chaos and violence that threatens to consume all of Scotland.

Dark Horse Books present, A Tale of Horror, a new gothic adaptation by Stefano Ascari and Simone D’Armini.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Horror

112 pages, Paperback

Published December 12, 2023

Reviews

[Rod Brown · Rating 2 out of 5]

A cheesy attempt to turn Macbeth into a full-on horror story by going all in on the gore, amping up the roles of the three witches and Hecate, and introducing a folk magician and a bunch of monsters for the climactic battle.

It's a pretty short adaptation, so it dumps all nuance and Shakespearean language as it zips through the bare bones of the play's plot, looking only for the eerie or bloody bits.

Cool idea, subpar execution.


FOR REFERENCE:

Contents: Prologue. A Night of Knives and Tots -- First Act. The Promises of Darkness -- Second Act. Family Ties -- Third Act. Green Hell -- Sketchbook

[Joanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

For anyone looking to explore Macbeth in an engaging and accessible way, this take offers a fresh perspective. By transforming Shakespeare's classic tragedy into a horror graphic novel, it reimagines the witches as central, all-powerful characters who relish manipulating Macbeth’s fate. This adaptation blends Shakespeare’s timeless themes with atmospheric Gothic cartooning, making the story both approachable and thrilling for new audiences, as well as amplifying the tension and madness of Macbeth's unraveling, making it both fun and eerie to experience.

This version is particularly well-suited for readers who might find Shakespeare's original language intimidating. …like me, for instance. 🎭🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️🧙‍♀️👑👸🏻🤴🏻🫅🔪💀👻😵🪦(now I get it) 🤓🥳

[Carissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think if I had gone into it without the expectation that this would be a faithful retelling, I would've been less disappointed. It almost felt like AU fanfic. But the illustrators are definitely talented people, and the characters were very stylized. I don't think I enjoyed the switching on and off of Scottish dialogue or keywords the characters seemed to use for a page and then stop, alternating between the two.

[Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

THE ART FOR THIS IS STUNNING!! I loved the horror take on Macbeth it was so cool. It was slightly funny while still keeping lots of the original text

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pick this up if you're a fan of Shakespeare and horror.

Macbeth is my favorite work of Shakespeare, so I had to check this out.

The authors stick to the basic plotline and use some of Shakespeare's lines., as well

However, they move the three witches to the forefront, creating a vivid and forceful supernatural world surrounding Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Macduff, Banquo, and the rest.

The illustrations are great - all black, white, and red, with a moment of green (thanks to an appearance of the Green Man from folklore), which only serves to emphasis the motif of blood, which is constant throughout the original play and this work.

All in all, a quick read for Shakespeare and horror fans.

*graphic violent images

[Lucas · Rating 4 out of 5]

A gothic horror reinterpretation of The Tragedy of Macbeth. Part Bloodborne, part Peaky Blinders. It's a whole lot of fun, and surprisingly true to the original considering how wild it gets. The art is surprisingly cartoony for such a successful Shakespeare adaptation, but it's also wonderfully composed and strikingly colored. I honestly only looked at this because a client of ours is doing his thesis on Macbeth, but I'm very glad I read it !

[Dania · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Double double, toil the trouble...."

Wow, this horror retelling of Macbeth by Stefano Ascari and Simone D'Armini really took the morbidly dark aspects of the play up SEVERAL notches!

The illustrations are sure to give an imaginative reader some nightmares for sure- but seeing gory art and the ugliness of the human condition at times of war and strife really hits different considering the current world affairs. As the three witch sisters said: "Fair is foul and foul is fair..."

[Bekka · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 round up to a 4 stars.
This was a really fun take on Macbeth - I loved the more supernatural elements getting highlighted, though I do wish that they had been gone into more as they were SO interesting!
The artwork was also so good, especially the colour palette!
TW for blood, death, murder, death of parents, childbirth, death in childbirth, mental health issues, stabbing.

[Tatum Murdock · Rating 4 out of 5]

Art style: amazing
Gothic horror telling of Macbeth: loved it
Depth/length: sad it wasn’t longer and I feel it lost a bit of narrative “soul”, but I’ll cut some slack due to how long it probably took to draw just a single page of this graphic novel
Personal enjoyment: 4.5/5

[Pietro Rossi · Rating 3 out of 5]

(Note to self: borrowed from library)

An adaptation of William Shakespeare's play into graphic novel and more accessible format. Additionally, it's been interpreted, as the title more than implies. 

The dialogue is good, truncating Shakespeare's prose into reasonably  modern language, but with many iconic lines left intact. The update is good.

Visually, the panels are 'busy'. There's too much going on that I find distracting. Others may love the intricateness of the layers, but it's down to personal taste. 4/10

Scoring: 0 bad; 1-3 poor; 4-6 average; 7-9 good; 10 excellent.

[Gunnar Hendrich · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gut gemeinte drei Sterne. Meins ist es nicht. Dafür, dass die Geschichte sehr stark ins fantastische gleitet, finde ich es unangemessen, sich dann immer wieder an Originalzitaten zu bedienen. Wenn es schon eine lose Adaption ist, dann doch bitte richtig. In sich ist das Konzept aber schlüssig und zeichnerisch sehr schön umgesetzt, auch wenn mir da die bewussten Anachronismen sauer aufstoßen.

[Tia · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this graphic novel. It was the perfect amount of gore and witchcraft/supernatural aspects to it.
The drawings were dope too! I really enjoyed looking at them while reading.
I would definitely recommend this book to anyone into graphic novels.

[Nicholas Garcia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cool take on Macbeth. Artwork was super dark but played with color really well and breaking the traditional panel format. I especially liked the characterization of the three witches. Graphic novel/BD adaptation made Macbeth much more accessible to me: I’ve never read the original or seen the play.

[Colleen Downey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Found while looking up options in a reading challenge. I love theater however I have even read or seen the Scottish play . The art work was fantasticly designed, in the darkness of the story. Bloody and dark. A very good quick read . Where the images are all horrifically beautiful

[Bethany · Rating 3 out of 5]

I believe there are 2 graphic novel versions of Macbeth that came out recently. I'm looking forward to finding that other one to compare.

[Mikael · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is a tale told by an idiot,
Full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing

[Monty · Rating 4 out of 5]

The artwork is really amazing on this one!

[Mave · Rating 5 out of 5]

Macbeth as a play will always have a space in my heart.

[mehfuz · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved the art style, but it felt too short and rushed.

[Sqwiggens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved the art style so much. It fully encompasses the horror of this story in a most fantastical and gothic way. A classic story given justice in this graphic novel.

[Clint · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’ve read/watched a ton of retellings of Macbeth, so a comic version explicitly framed as a horror story interested me, but this one ended up being a bit more miss than hit. Part of that is the writing, which mixes dialogue written in a phonetic Scottish accent with occasionally Shakespeare-accurate lines that aren’t always the easiest to drop in and out of comprehending when they’re so sporadic, and then mixes all that with anachronistic modern dialogue that includes terms like “bestie” and edgy profanity. That confusedness carries over into the tone as well, which can’t seem to decide if it’s tongue-in-cheek mall goth or seriously grim splatterpunk.

The art is sadly also a mixed bag. Despite some pages being drawn with obvious talent, it distractingly steals most of its visual identity wholesale from the videogame Bloodborne (a glaring suspicion I laughed to see confirmed in the back pages) to the point that it cameos several character designs from that game in various crowd shots. It’s also weirdly cartoony, and the end result feels more like a passionate but amateur webcomic spun out of Bloodborne fan fiction than anything else.

[Tamar Marvin · Rating 3 out of 5]

A visually compelling adaptation, this graphic novel version of Macbeth skews (gleefully) towards horror, as its title announces. It's not an easy feat to breathe new life into this vaunted classic, and the writer-artist has managed to do just that. The opening is especially well done and an inventive reordering of the tale. I felt that Lady Macbeth was a little too narrowly drawn, and I'm not personally a fan of horror, so the rating reflects personal taste more than the overall quality of the work, which is high.

[Chad · Rating 3 out of 5]

Macbeth is the Shakespeare story I'd choose if I had to give it a horror slant. I mean, it honestly has one to begin with, with all of the witches and macabre visions in it already. The creators just expand upon it while maintaining a Shakespearian vibe. It's a solid gothic take on the play.

[Alessia Pareto · Rating 3 out of 5]

Non leggo graphic novel ma molto carino, mi ha preso nonostante predomina il color rosso, arancione e nero. Le immagine alcune sono carine nonostante un po' horror altre si capisce che sono state disegnate da due persone diverse.

[arden · Rating 1 out of 5]

the only part I liked about this was macduff. they changed so many plot points and truly destroyed the characterization of madness and depravity- both being elements that would have worked very well for Gothic horror. I get that it's an adaptation, but not one that was done very well imo

[Engel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Might be one of my favorite graphic novels

[EleNoir · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5

[booklover · Rating 4 out of 5]

The visuals in this are breathtaking! I really enjoyed the horror spin on Macbeth it was such a unique approach. It had some humor mixed in while still staying true to much of the original text.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a bad read with cool, horrorshow art. I would have preferred a more faithful retell, but this is okay!

[Celestial Philomath · Rating 2 out of 5]

Creative idea, sadly the art style wasn't my cup of tea