Bookmonkey vs Hack/Slash: Day Fourteen

From One-Shots to an Ongoing Series

For the first three years of Hack/Slash the title was a series of one-shot comics, coming out a few times a year and although the stories connected with each other, previous issues were not necessary to follow the action in the series.

With the success of 2006's Hack/Slash vs. Chucky in which Cassie and Vlad fought popular horror movie character Charles Lee Ray (better known as the possessed doll "Chucky"), it was decided to move the series into an ongoing format from that point forward.  Also, the ongoing series featured penciller Emily Stone, who gave the series a more cohesive look overall, as compared to the many different pencillers and illustrators used in the earlier issues.  Different pencillers would work on specific issues of Hack/Slash as an ongoing title, but the artwork becomes much more uniform from this point forward.

In the original one-shots series Cassie fought Slashers which included a number of straight-forward "kill, but won't stay dead" types (like Halloween's (1978) Michael Meyers), a Slasher who attacked his victims through their dreams (like A Nightmare on Elm Street's (1984)Freddy Kruger) and even a Slasher who used her commands over another sleeping Slasher to kill her intended victims (not unlike the 1920 German film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari).

With the ongoing series, Seeley was looking forward to "...introduc[ing] more supporting characters, and have crazy little things like subplots!..and...finally hav[ing] the space to tell the story of Cassie's dad, which we've never really touched upon in the space of the one-shots." (Richards, 2007) At this point in the series Seeley also begins looking at other aspects of modern horror films, beyond the Slasher sub-genre with concepts like the rise of torture horror (like the Saw and Hostel series), and even classic concepts like the Faustian bargain (deal with the devil) and more.

It's also interesting to note that even as far back as 2007, Seeley had an overall plan for the series; "I do have an end," he said. "But the hope is that I don't have to get to it anytime soon. I can see myself doing a Garth Ennis or [Neil] Gaiman and going for 60 issues. So, ya'know, make sure ya buy it, so I can do all the cool stuff you won't get in any other book!" (ibid.)

IMAGE USED

Hack/Slash Omnibus #2 Cover.  Retrieved Online from

http://bloody-disgusting.com/photosizer/upload/HackSlaOmni2.jpg

WORKS CITED
Richards, D. (2007, February 8). "'Hack' Writer: Seeley talks Hack/Slash Ongoing" in Comic Book Resources. Retrieved online from http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=9279