Wednesday Review: Trick 'R Treat: Days of the Dead

This is the closest to the wire I've come when writing a Wednesday Review. As I write this, it's Monday morning (as I edit it it's Tuesday), and my breakfast is cooking (ditto). The reason I've waited so late (for me, anyway) is that I'm utterly intimidated by this subject matter. Trick 'R Treat is my favorite movie of all time, so the idea of reviewing any continuation of it is frightening, because I have a simultaneous desire to both love and despise the work.

I'd like to begin by saying that Days of the Dead is definitely not Trick 'R Treat 2. The comic deals with four, mostly unconnected stories, set centuries apart. I get the impression that Dougherty knew some of his stories would be too expensive to adapt with any budget likely to be given to a Trick 'R Treat movie, so he gave us the major events in Sam's existence in comic book form. I expect the actual movies will continue to consists of nights that, from Sam's perspective at least, are relatively uneventful.

The premise of the comic is that a little girl is frightened by Halloween, and her grandfather tells her four stories in an effort to make her more comfortable going trick-or-treating. During the stories the two sit on their front porch, with the grandfather carving a pumpkin, creating an obvious visual reference to Charlie and Principal Wilkins from the original film.

As with Trick 'R Treat Sam's role is not prominent in all the stories. Here, he's an active participant in only the first two, reversing the structure of the original film, where Sam's story was told last. These two stories give us a much greater incite into Sam's origin, nature, and true power. The movie showed us what happens when Sam get's annoyed, here we find out what happens when he gets mad.

The reason for this flip in the structure seems to be two-fold: Firstly, the stories are told chronologically. More importantly, the comic has an in-universe narrator, telling the stories in ascending order of personal importance. The final story is the only one that happened within his lifetime, and thus the most significant to him.

The art is very...ok. Each section is done by a different artist, in a different style. However, I'm not sure if this was an artistic choice, or merely one of convenience. The first and third stories (“Seed” and “Echoes”) go for more stylized art, while the second and last (“Corn Maiden” and “Monster Mash”) are drawn more realistically. I can't find any pattern there, and I somewhat suspect they had four different artists due to time constraints. “Corn Maiden” in particular is a baffling choice, being set in a time and a culture far more removed from the narrator than “Echoes,” I would have expected it to have the more abstract style.

As for my opinions on the quality of the stories, I'd say they vary quite significantly. They're not bad. Dougherty doesn't really write “bad,” but this doesn't match the perfection of his Magnum Opus. I'd say “Seed” and “Monster Mash” are easily the best of the bunch, with “Corn Maiden” coming in third. The first and last stories alone, however, are easily worth the price of the comic.

I sincerely hope that Trick 'R Treat 2 is on it's way. It's unlikely to live up the original's glory, but Sam is still desperately in need of another run. Until then, however, this nice little comic book should tide us over.