The line that separates a hero from a monster is easier to cross than we think. A man with the abilities of a spider is only ever a bad day away from fully embracing the insect and burying an entire city in webs. A woman that can turn invisible could easily become a sadistic psychological tormentor that tricks people into thinking their houses are haunted by angry ghosts.
Image Comics’ latest iteration of their Creepshow comic contemplates this potential turn in a themed 5-issue series called Super Creepshow, featuring stories about superheroes that embrace the horrors their kind can conjure.
Issue #5 is perhaps the crowning achievement here, focusing more on the people that look up to superheroes rather than on the heroes themselves. It’s a smart reversal that comments on one of the most contentious aspects of comics culture: toxic fandom.
The first story is titled “Superfan” and it’s written by Ram V and illustrated by Riccardo Burchielli (with Matteo Vattani on colors and Pat Brosseau on letters), and it follows a stubborn old-school fan that’s ultra protective of a comic book character called Klonova. It deals in obsession and how it can make a veteran comics supporter become a villainous gatekeeper with dangerous ideas of his own.
Kilonova is an amalgamation of popular characters that possess god-like powers such as Superman, Dr. Manhattan, and Sentry. He meets this fan in a strange place that essentially serves as an altar to him, a room that houses his entire comic book history along with the collectibles that further cement his presence in the medium. What the fan wants from him, though, is where horror comes in. Who owns who becomes the defining question that pushes the story forward.
The second story is titled “Everyone Loves the Phantom Professor” and it’s written by Christian Ward and illustrated by Fábio Veras (with Pat Brousseau on lettering once more). This one’s a play on Doctor Strange, but its focus lies on the source of his powers and how seductive they can be for the people that seek his help.
Ward and Veras land on a clever twist on the relationship between the hero and the people who depend on him. Fandom takes a terrifying twist here as it considers the damage a regular person can do if they ever come to acquire the hero’s powers. The results (which borrow a bit from the movie Weapons) are thought-provoking. They leave a lasting impression that’s hard to shake off once the reader is made aware of the cost of the Phantom Professor’s superpowers.
Both stories succeed in putting the burden of consequence on the civilians. While the superheroes showcase strange personality traits and conflicting philosophies as to who they are and what their personas represent, it’s regular people who turn them into objects of fear.
Ram V and Burchielli do so by leaning into the power dynamics between hero and fan and how devastatingly unequal they are. What one expects from the other becomes the very thing that can lead to misguided formulations of character ownership and how it can lead to a distortion of the things it gives meaning to. They extract a lot of dread here, existential in nature.
Ward and Veras go for the gut punch. Their reveal shatters the very notion of heroism and asks readers to put themselves in a position of supreme power. And then, it throws a left hook. The cost power incurs is laid bare, its ugliness on full display. The questions it leaves the readers with demand serious consideration. Any potential answers are sure to be accompanied by a haunting quality.
The two stories contained in Super Creepshow #5 expand on the things that can be done by pairing superheroes with horror. They do an exceptional job of deconstructing not just the heroes but the people they’re supposed to protect. If anything, it asks us to question the very notion of innocence comics tend to bestow upon bystanders. Horror is great at revealing how easy it is for regular people to succumb to their darkest desires. In Super Creepshow #5 we’re shown that even superheroes should be afraid of civilians and their capacity for evil, especially when they’re screaming for help.
