Vampire: The Masquerade: Toreador

    (Moonstone, 2001)
™ and ©2002

A local late-night Elvira-type television host is approached by a stranger who is seemingly attracted to her real-life persona rather than her better-known fictional TV identity, Fannie Fang. Intrigued, she has a few drinks with this man — who turns out to have quite a story to tell.

This story is somewhat longer than it needs to be, but writer Rafael Nieves at least makes good use of the 48 pages. In the tradition of some of the best Twilight Zone episodes or old E.C. horror comics, Nieves provides a lengthy explanation of the characters’ backgrounds and histories. By doing this, the reader is given a reason to care about the characters’ fate, which is often difficult to do in stand-alone stories with unfamiliar faces.

Vince Locke’s art is somewhat reminiscent of Alfedo Alcala’s and does a nice job of telling the story with simple panel layouts rather than trying to dazzle with splash pages and pin-up shots. The introductory pages, however, are drawn in shadowy, charcoal greytones and are the most beautiful pages in the book. Readers who don’t flip through the book beforehand may be disappointed to find out that the entire story isn’t rendered in this style.

As far as vampire stories go, this one isn’t terribly unusual, but it’s, nonetheless, a fine example of this genre and shouldn’t be missed by horror fans.

— Jim Johnson
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