CSBG Archive
The Scariest Comic Books of All Time! – Three Shadows
A reader named Chris S. suggested that I devote October to the scariest comic books of all-time, as suggested by you readers out there! Sounds like a plan to me! So all October-long, I’ll be featuring 31 comic book tales of terror, based on YOUR suggestions! So e-mail me at bcronin@comicbookresources.com your scary suggestions! Here is an archive of all the comics featured so far!
Commenter Kate M. suggested I feature Cyril Pedrosa’s graphic novel, Three Shadows, about a husband and wife dealing with the realization that their son might very well be torn away from them.
Enjoy!
This story, translated from the French by First Second Books, tells the tale of a young married couple named Louis and Lise and their son Joachim. They live on a farm in the countryside and everything is just nice and fun and simple until, well, one day things changed…for the worse.
Let’s see how Pedrosa handles the reveal (brilliantly, I might add)…
How spooky is that? Pedrosa really nails that scene beautifully.
In any event, the three shadows are here for Joachim. Effectively, his life is over. But if you’re his parents, how can you accept something so absurd as “oh, okay, three shadows are here to end our son’s life, oh well, what are you going to do?”
That’s what this book is really about – showing how Louis and Lise are driven to extremes (particularly Louis) in protecting their son. And in the process of protecting him, are they losing each other?
This is a powerful work with striking, dynamic artwork.
Click here to see First Second’s page for the book, including some more preview pages.
5 Comments
Tuomas
October 19, 2011 at 6:25 am
This was a great comic, but I don’t think it was particularly scary. The three shadows merely symbolize the inevitable, immutable nature of death, they’re not horror movie monsters. Joachim is already dead when the story begins, the rest of it is about Louis slowly coming to accept this fact.
chad
October 19, 2011 at 6:52 am
intrigued going to have to track down a copy and find out why three shadows have decided to do deaths job way too early for jothan.
sandwich eater
October 19, 2011 at 9:24 am
Here are my suggetions. How about some EC comics horror? Also, the first appearance of Wendigo in the Incredible Hulk is a little creepy.
AS
October 19, 2011 at 10:58 am
I’d say that the beginning of the book and the first appearances of shadows is indeed scary, though the mood does shift after that. But a great book nevertheless.
Seth T. Hahne
October 19, 2011 at 10:25 pm
Yeah, an emotional book but not really so much scary or in the realm of horror (and I say that with a two-year-old who is just coming off a severe and scary bout of croup and a two-week-old that we’re trying to protect from the same). That said, I loved Three Shadows and hope to see a lot more work from Pedrosa. His sense of storytelling not just in the panel-to-panel but even in his character designs is wonderful.