I discovered something incredibly cool this afternoon — it turns out that the good people over at Dark Horse Comics quoted me in their 2019 promotion of Matt Wagner’s superb Grendel: Devil’s Odyssey. The eight-issue limited series marked the return of the iconic Grendel Prime, who I last followed as a zealous young fan in the pages Grendel Tales (1993-1997), Batman/Grendel II (1996) and Grendel: Past Prime (2000).
Dark Horse quoted a review I wrote of Wagner’s Grendel: Omnibus Volume 1 (2012), which was a compilation of the writer-artist’s brilliant early work on the title.
I’m thrilled. Wagner’s a genius — and while Grendel’s dark, violent content is not for everyone, it’s always been a seminal title for the medium of comics. I remember greedily snapping up back issues when I was a college student in 1992 — I never thought the day would arrive when a review of mine would be referenced to attract new fans.
So I’m introducing a dear friend tonight to “28 Days Later” (2002). It is possibly my favorite horror film of all time, maybe even narrowly beating out “Aliens” (1986), “Alien 3” (1992), John Carpenter’s “The Thing” (1982), the Sutherland-tacular 1978 version of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” and George A. Romero’s first three “Dead” films (1968, 1978, 1985). (Whenever “Star Wars” fans refer to their “Holy Trilogy,” I muse inwardly that those last three are its equivalent for zombie horror fans.)
My friend thinks it’s funny that I refer to “28 Days Later” as “my sacred cow.” I’ll be crestfallen if she does not like it, and I told her as much. And that’s weird for me … I usually don’t feel let down when someone doesn’t enjoy the same books, movies or music that I do. Not everything is for everyone. Art would lose its mystique if it weren’t subjective. If all art appealed to all people, it would lose all its appeal altogether.
Part of me feels, unconsciously perhaps, that “28 Days Later” is the kind of film that “redeems” the horror genre (even though no genre needs such redemption — if art is well made or if it affects people, then it’s just fine).
Most comic book fans of my generation can tell you how people can occasionally roll their eyes at their favorite medium. (Comics have far greater mainstream acceptance today than when I started reading them in the 1990’s.) For horror fans, it’s sometimes worse. Horror is a genre that is easily pathologized — and sometimes with good reason, because a portion of what it produces is indeed cheap or exploitative. I wish I could accurately describe for you the looks I’ve gotten when acquaintances find out that I’m a horror fan. They aren’t charitable.
“28 Days Later” and movies like it are so good that they elevate horror to a level that demands respect from the uninitiated. It is an intrinsically excellent film — it just happens to have a sci-f-/horror plot setup and setting. It’s beautifully directed by Danny Boyle, it’s perfectly scored and it’s masterfully performed by its cast — most notably by Cillian Murphy and Brendan Gleeson.
