Sleep – the one thing we take for granted … until we can’t get enough!
Creative Staff:
Writer: Steve Yockey
Artwork: Gregbo Watson & Marc Rosete
What They Say:
A group of researchers head to a remote location to check on some subjects who are going through a dangerous sleep experiment. But they’re completely unprepared for the horrors that await them inside the facility in which they’ve been welcomed.
Content (please note that portions of a review may contain spoilers):
When Doctor Miller and his graduate students visit the laboratory of the infamous Russian sleep researcher, Doctor Prosky, they are met with no answer until they try the side door of the building. It is then when his forgetful assistant Maxine answers and notifies them that the good doctor was called away at the last minute. After much bickering from the annoyed pupils, Miller calms everyone down and asks to see the results of the study. While the usual duration of the deprivation studies are normally five days, after much prodding, the attendant finally admits that the current period has been stretched to twelve days without sleep.
Of course, Dr. Miller is horrified as to the extent of this research and his fears are elevated when Maxine tells him that the subjects were the ones who wanted the experiment to continue. But when she informs them that the cameras were also smashed and the observation window looks like it has been caked over with dried blood, his nightmares are close to coming true. As the associate races to retrieve the enclosure’s key, the panicked trio contemplates as to the results of this prolonged extension of the research. Psychological trauma would be the least of their worries, but as the minutes tick away, they cannot but help to ponder the sanity of this undertaking. Why would anyone volunteer to be divested from the comforting shroud of sleep? One cannot dream of this tragedy, and soon, those involved may soon be wrested into its eternal slumber.
In Summary:
Steve Yockey has turned what could have been a pleasant venture into the realm of dreams into a terrifying nightmare! We have all read, heard, saw or experienced first hand the results of this kind of deprivation and the current generation’s obsession of trying to do more in one day have resulted in too many problems caused by this denial. But when people purposely push themselves past their limits, one has to wonder what will happen to the human body, and this story graphically presents the probable toll in morbid detail. Caffeine, the wonder drug that too many of us consume on a daily basis, it is hard to imagine how we would get through our day without it. But the horror of having or wanting to stay alert without it, for a single day, let alone almost two weeks is an oddity in itself. Yockey has imagined what could have been an interesting experiment and turned it into a tale splendidly fitting for the series.
However, the narrative would have fallen flat if not for the shockingly effective work of Gregbo Watson and Marc Rosete. Their tenures in the Zenescopic universe of Wonderland have served them well as they divine from that realm the insanity and turn it upside down to conform to a world of these sleepless madmen. The story spirals downhill from the sunken eyes of Maxine, her forgetfulness, the psychosis as she taunts her prey and finally as the rest of the subjects are released. The whole feels like something which was gleaned from that psychedelic land, but it is grounded within the all too real depravity and loss of tenacity which we all have experience at one time or another.
Even the shift of drawing styles reflects the worsening symptoms of sleep deprivation. Gregbo Watson’s depictions on the first half of the book lure us into that delusional state as we slowly begin to forget even the simplest things, such as how to open a door or to stop an experiment when something has gone wrong. This stabilised familiarity was also delved into as it was shown in his artwork from Grimm Fairy Tales Presents Alice in Wonderland One-Shot; while it may have seemed wondrous, the story and events were all too real since they mimicked the life of the deranged serial killer, John Wayne Gacy. Watson’s illustrations project us into reality while Marc Rosete slowly drives us away from it.
Rosete’s adventures through the rabbit hole into the Grimm Fairy Tales Presents Wonderland are brilliant transitioned to the second half of the tale. Once Maxine opens the door, the true dementia from this degradation can begin. We can physically see the cruel realities of the effects: from the blood thirst etched on the volunteers’ faces to the frenzy in which they pursue anyone who is not one of their clan. The madness begins to tumble as the visitors fall one by one, just as someone’s sanity would if they truly went to Wonderland. Each victim is a scared animal being hunted by a pack of wild dogs, they may try to run, but the chase only incites the frenzy and sweetens the kill. The closing pages of Maxine remind me of the glee the Mad Hatter felt as he/she drove each of his hosts over the edge. They were enraptured from the pleasure in the act and Rosete has shown us the same insanity within these pages as a new version of the Jabberwocky brings the issue to a bloody close.
This issue of Grimm Tales of Terror colourfully illustrates the concept of what would happen if the inmates took over the asylum. How appropriate that the story starts and ends with Keres greeting the visitors while smoking, almost as if she were Morpheus, the God of Sleep, puffing on an opium pipe. It is a pleasure that the team of Yockey, Watson and Rosete brings this insanity to life as the strength drains from your dreams when you finish this terror and then try to sleep tonight. Better keep the lights on …
(In case you are wondering about the names on Watson’s cover written in backwards pseudo-Cyrillic graffiti, they are in order: his father, mother, himself, girlfriend and his son.)
Issue Grade: A+
Rating: 16+
Released By: Zenescope
Release Date: January 27th, 2015
MSRP: $3.99
