They’re lining-up outside Palais Garnier Opera House. There’s a production of Faust that’s set to be staged. There are certain things going on backstage which will emerge from the shadows in dramatic fashion. The drama that ensues is something that goes well beyond the confines of the stage in Universal Monsters: The Phantom of the Opera #1. Skybound’s ongoing connection with the classic horror studio continues in a series brought to page and panel by writer Tyler Boss and artist Martin Simmonds. The classic horror film is cast in a new light with moody visuals which glide around an engaging murder/mystery horror script.
Madamoiselle Biancarolli is about to go onstage. She looks in the mirror one last time. She tells herself that everyone loves her. She tells herself that all of Paris wants to be her. Then she leaves the dressing room and approaches the stage. Moments later she is dead. There’s a noose around her neck. Inspector Dubert is there to investigate the murder. Sometime later, he sees a crimson note in a wastebasket in the dressing room. “Leave Paris tonight,: it reads “or cease to feel the warmth of another sunrise.” There’s a watermark above the writing that might provide some clue as to who wrote the note...
Boss frames the script with a clever hand. The early 20th century theatrical drama moves along with a heavy sense of intrigue. Boss works with an ensemble of characters that all have diffeent connections with each other that add to the rich tapestry of the drama that shifts swiftly across the page. The real challenge with a murder/mystery script lies in the structure and the pacing of the intrigue. This can be very, very difficult to nail for the comics page...particularly in a very brief mini-series. In the opening quarter of the series, Boss places it all on the page with a fairly deft hand.
Boss places a great deal of faith in artist Martin Simmonds to capture the visual appeal of the story. So much of the appeal of the original Lon Chaney silent film rested in the visuals of The Paris Opera House. Simmonds is able to amplify the mystery of the horror with deliciously creepy color in a drama the plays out quite vividly on the faces of the characters without ever seeming at al exaggerated or amplified. It all feels so well-executed with dizzyingly impressive visuals.
It’s fun. The supernatural elements of the story feel particularly impressive in a stylish rendering that finds a rich and textured home on the comic book page. It’s really, really difficult to make a story like Phantom live between two covers in comic book format. It HAS been tried on occasion in the past in various ways. Boss and Simmonds do a remarkable job of giving it all precisely the amount of life that it’s going to need to saunter and glide its way through the remaining three issues in the series.
