Review of Clive Barker’s NightBreed Issue 1

The first issue of Boom! Studios eagerly anticipated new comic book series Clive Barker’s Nightbreed hit the shelves in the UK on 28 May, finally expanding on the mythos Clive Barker created in 1988 in the novel Cabal, and in the movie adaptation Nightbreed. A dark, horrific, but ultimately quite moving tale of a group of freaks, misfits and monsters living in Midian, a secret underground community beneath a cemetery, Nightbreed has gained a devoted cult following over the past few decades. An Occupy Midian movement was even formed as an online pressure group to demand the release of the full unedited vision of the Nightbreed movie Barker intended, but never got to release.

Occupy Midian haven’t got their way just yet, but the first issue of this new series of comics is sure to delight Nightbreed fans as much as readers new to the gloriously strange world of Midian. Piotr Kowalski’s artwork is exquisite, truly capturing the macabre settings of the original book and film, and resurrecting the strange cast of disparate characters; the savage, the lonely and the seductive with all their drives, hungers and desires.

In the original novel, we discover little about how the various bizarre citizens of Midian came to arrive there, and this is what the comic series sets out to address. The narrative flits back and forward in time, introducing us to characters before they arrived at Midian, building on their back-story and expanding the Nightbreed mythos. The themes of isolation, prejudice and persecution so evident in the novel are continued and developed as the future citizens of Midian struggle to live above ground amongst ‘normal’ people.

Of course as in the novel and movie, the real monsters are not necessarily who they appear to be. The distinctions between good and evil, beauty and beast are often blurred; the hunted can become the hunter, the freak can become an object of forbidden lust. This was always a big part of the appeal of Nightbreed and it’s great to see this spirit continued in this new expansion of the story.

This first issue shows great promise about what could be a fantastic series, and will please existing fans of Nightbreed and gain many more with its blend of gruesome horror, and strange sensuality. Midian has opened its gates once more.