VAMPIRELLA (VOL. 5) #24 – Review

VAMPIRELLA (VOL. 5) #24, available from Dynamite Comics on September 22nd, 2021, pits Vampirella against Shane the First Man and the Scarlet Legion to stop them from killing an innocent boy.

The Details

• Written By: Christopher Priest
• Art By: Ergün Gündüz, Chris Graves
• Colors By: Mohan
• Letters By: Willie Schubert
• Cover Art By: Lucio Parrillo (cover A)
• Cover Price: $3.99
• Release Date: September 22, 2021

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Was It Good?

It’s better. Not super great but better.

The struggle we’ve had with Priest’s run on Vampirella is the sporadic and loosely connected narrative style that’s a signature of Priest’s work. Priest stories don’t follow a clear, linear structure. Readers are tossed to and fro with little pockets of scenes that often don’t follow any pattern or timeline that anyone could reasonably follow. In other words, Priest stories are like a jigsaw puzzle where you’re given the pieces and asked to assemble them yourself. Sometimes, a few pieces are left that don’t fit anywhere when you’re asked to move on to the next puzzle.

That’s not to say Priest isn’t a good writer. That is to say, there’s a good reason why Priest isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and that style has a direct impact on the mass appeal of a comic. That said, the narrative here is better in the sense that some of the puzzle pieces have been assembled for you and it doesn’t take AS much work to figure out what’s going on.

I like the premise in this arc quite a lot (see specifics in the next section below). Vampirella is placed in the position of doing the right thing when the right thing isn’t so clear. Does she save the boy knowing he “might” grow up to be a monster, or does she kill an innocent boy to eliminate risk to the entire world?

Yes, it’s the “would you kill Hitler as a child?” gambit, replacing Hitler with Dracula. However, the tension and conflict are raised well beyond the philosophical challenge because multiple forces are trying to make the decision for Vampirella, and she’s not one to get steamrolled. The forces against Vampirella want the same goal, but they’ve chosen to go about it in different ways.

To be fair, some puzzle pieces are assembled but others are not. It’s sometimes a struggle to quickly figure out where we are in the timeline, and when you have to waste mental cycles working it out as you’re reading, it pulls you out of the story. There are caption boxes for each major scene change but they don’t always include a time period.

As for the art, it’s okay. There’s a clear transition point where Gündüz drops off the issue and Graves takes over halfway through that’s good enough to ignore but not so good that the change isn’t noticeable. It’s noticeable. Thankfully, Gündüz and Graves are similar in quality, even if their styles are not quite the same, so at the very least, the shift doesn’t bring the book down or up in any way.

What’s It About?

[SPOILERS AHEAD – Click here if you just want the score without spoilers]

First, sink your teeth into our VAMPIRELLA (VOL. 5) #23 review to get caught up.

We begin with Vampirella visiting something called the Oracle, a large talking vampire skull that may have a solution to curing Matthew of the Dracula infection in his blood. The Oracle is a leader to modern vampires and is not thrilled to entertain Vampirella’s presence since she’s a known vampire killer. However, the Oracle agrees to cooperate since Dracula’s resurrection is not something anyone wants.

Meanwhile, Matthew is in an Atlanta safe house guarded by Victory and the Cauldryn. Struggling to make sense of everything, Victory fills him in on why he doesn’t remember Vampirella from when he was a child (memory wipe) and why so many people are trying to kill him.

During a flashback, we see Vampirella going to great lengths to find a doctor that will develop a vaccine that “might” suppress the Dracula gene. Despite her efforts, the Scarlet Legion isn’t taking any chances and we see Vampirella going all out to stop the Legion from killing the boy she’s grown to love.

We conclude the issue with a confused orphan finding a new home, the Scarlet Legion saying a little prayer, and Pantha offering to get ice cream for a friend.

Final Thoughts

VAMPIRELLA (VOL. 5) #24 flitters between the past and present to show how Vampirella first saves the boy and then the man to stop the resurrection of Dracula. The old “would you kill Hitler as a child?” problem gets an interesting twist, and the dramatic tension gets turned up several notches for a tense story. That said, the art has some consistency problems when it transitions from one artist to the other, and the narrative flow is almost is nowhere near straight or clear

Score: 7/10