Gary Gianni’s Monstermen and Other Scary Stories by Gary Gianni

This was an interesting collection. The first half consisted of five graphic /comic stories by Gary Gianni. His Monstermen series was introduced as a companion to the Hellboy series. Lawrence St George is a film maker and hunter of the supernatural. Partnered with Benedict, an ancient knight who can’t die, they search out and stop a variety of demons from taking over the world. They are quick stories reminiscent of those from the early days of movies. St George looks a bit like Vincent Price. I would believe these are set in a time such as the 1930’s if it wasn’t for the occasional glimpse of a computer or other technology now and again. I rather enjoyed these. I do prefer color to black and white but the drawings gave it a spookier, old movie feel. There’s enough action to pull you through and enough character development that you feel like you know the characters towards the end. I look forward to more Monstermen stories. The second half of the book didn’t delight me as much as the first. It was stories but not told in graphic/comic form. Personally, I think it disrupted the flow of the book. Not that the stories were bad but they felt like they should be a separate book. The stories were illustrated by Gary Gianni but not written by him which made it feel more like a separate book. Had they been additional stories about Monstermen maybe I would have felt differently.