Comic Book Superhero Store - Essential Tomb of Dracula, Vol. 4 (Marvel Essentials)

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Binding: Paperback Dewey Decimal Number: 741.5973 EAN: 9780785117094 ISBN: 0785117091 Label: Marvel Comics Manufacturer: Marvel Comics Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 576 Publication Date: 2005-04-13 Publisher: Marvel Comics Studio: Marvel Comics
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Editorial Reviews: The Essential Tomb of Dracula series continues featuring tales of Dracula through the ages - from when he first became a vampire and eventually Lord of the Undead to his resurfacing in modern times. Collects stories from Tomb of Dracula Magazine #2, 4-6, Dracula Lives! #1-13 and Frankenstein Monster #7-9.
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Not as good as the first three volumes Comment: In the 1970s, Marvel had a reasonably long-running comic book called Tomb of Dracula that benefited from having a single writer and artist for most of the run. This allowed consistency and the ability to have nice, long story arcs in the story of Dracula and the people out to stop him. The series concluded in its 70th issue, and is covered in its entirety in the first three volumes of The Essential Tomb of Dracula. Volume Four is a collection of stories that take place both before and after the principal storyline. Despite the title, only a few of the comics that this collection features actually were named Tomb of Dracula, and these were actually Tomb of Dracula Magazine, not the original comic. In addition, there are stories from Dracula Lives and Frankenstein Monster (the latter of which can also be found in the Essential Monster of Frankenstein. The bulk of the stories take place in the past, starting with Dracula's origin and his assumption of the role of Lord of the Undead. Other stories take place at various times between the 1500s and modern day, typically featuring people trying to take advantage of the vampire and usually coming out the worst for it. On rare occasion, Dracula is killed, but when you're undead, death is a merely temporary condition. Just as the original comic was a quality product due to consistency, this volume suffers as it is a mishmash of different writers and artists. Also, outside of Dracula, there are no other regular characters, which I find detrimental: the best comics usually have a good supporting cast. Fortunately, there are few bad stories and a decent amount of good ones, but compared to other Essential collections, this merits only a high three stars. After the first three volumes of Essential Tomb of Dracula, this one is interesting but still a letdown. Customer Rating: Summary: Graphic SF Reader Comment: The end of the Tomb of Dracula series is contained in this volume. There are other things like Dracula magazines and other bits and pieces put in to fill it out. Note that it has been discovered that the excellent original artwork has been altered and censored in some cases. That sort of prudishness in very disappointing in something that was always aimed at adults. Customer Rating: Summary: Surprisingly good. Comment: This volume could be suspected of being solely for completists, since it reprints little-known short stories from Marvel's many horror mags. In fact, before reading it, I feared it might feel like a lot of inventory material. I was quite happy to be proven wrong. Editorial care was taken to present these stories in chronological order, giving them a biographical flavor (we follow Dracula from the late XVth century to the present). The artwork is unequal, but we're treated to some good work by Neal Adams, John Buscema and Alan Lee Weis, by many Filipino artists whose art never looks so good as in black and white, by a young Paul Gulacy and by Dracula's best illustrator ever, Gene Colan. This final Essential Dracula tome can not compete with the previous three, since they presented the brilliant run of the main Dracula title by Wolfman and Colan; however, it certainly makes a welcome companion. And as ever, at the price, it's a bargain. Customer Rating: Summary: Reprinting all of Marvel's black & white "Dracula" stories Comment: I was surprised there was a Volume 4 of the "Essential Tomb of Dracula" because once they got to the end of the run of the Marvel comic book mostly written by Marv Wolfman and drawn by Gene Colan, I figured that was it. But there were some black & white magazines being put out at the same time and it is largely the Dracula stories from those titles that are collected here. However, there is also the original pencil art for the pages that Wolfman and Colan had to excise from "Tomb of Dracula" #70 when the finale was finally decided to be a double-issue. Half the pages have dialogue and there is an issue break, so you can have some fun figuring where these pages would have gone. But at least fans of the comic book get a little something new here even if they are familiar with all of the reprints. What we have in Volume are stories from issues #2-6 of "Tomb of Dracula" magazine, "Dracula Lives" #1-13, and "Frankenstein Monster" #7-9. However, the neat thing about this collection is that the stories are, for the most part, arranged "chronologically" according to the "life" of Dracula. After an article on "Bloodline: A Probable Outline of the Career of Count Vlad Dracula" compiled by Peter Gillis we go back to 1452 with the Marvel origin of the character in "That Dracula May Live Again" by Marv Wolfman and Neal Adams. There are six stories from the 15th century, another dozen before Stoker's "Dracula" in 1890, a three-part encounter with the Frankenstein Monster in 1898 (already reprinted in the "Essential Monster of Frankenstein"), and then 20th century stories from 1903, 1926, and 1944 (the Nazis meet Dracula) before we get to "Today" and the final eleven stories. This is an uneven collection of stories, which is to be expected with other Marvel writers and artists getting into the act in telling Dracula stories. The best of the bunch are "Sanctuary" by Roger McKenzie and Colon, the Adams drawn story mentioned above, "Suffer Not a Witch" by Roy Thomas with art by Alan Weiss and Dick Giordano, the Civil War tale "A House Divided" by James Shooter and Colan (okay, any time Colan draws a Dracula story it just looks so much better than, say, Frank Robbins), the short "Bounty for a Vampire" by Tony Isabell and Tony DeZeuniga," and "A Night in the Unlife" by Gerry Conway and Alfredo Alcala." But "This Blood Is Mine," a story that has Dracula meeting up with the Countess Elizabeth Bathory, is particularly disappointing as do most of the attempts to introduce the Count into a particular time and place (e.g., the Fascist Rome of 1926 passing for gangland Chicago). This has to be the last volume in the collection and it certainly qualifies as complete from my perspective. I appreciate having "The Tomb of Dracula" completed, but if they would just get further along with the "Essential Fantastic Four," "Essential Thor," and "Essential Daredevil" I could be even happier. More Reviews

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