Dylan Dog 415: Vendetta in mask, review

Dylan Dog 415

How many ghosts, zombies, vampires and even aliens from outer space has our Dylan faced? Yet, as Tiziano Sclavi himself reminded us many times, "We are the real monsters", perhaps a little to pay homage - as he usually did - to the homonymous cult film with Vincent Price (where he plays a vampire, just to stay on the subject), but above all to indicate that only we human beings can be inhuman by staining ourselves with the most atrocious monstrosities. In this new issue just arrived on newsstands, Vendetta in mask with the story of Gabriella Contu we will also be able to remember how much the kids can be really scary.

But more than the kids, the real nightmare of this story it is marginalization. Who in one way, who in another, even you who are reading, somehow know the horror of not having been accepted for something. If you could, would you have called the Craven Road tenant to help?

Dylan Dog, disguised revenge ... but not too much

In the story The Sons of Wheat (contained in the collection Sometimes come back, 1978) by Stephen King recurs a group of kids, well armed and better with sticks and agricultural tools. It is one of the first things that came to our mind when we saw the small band protagonist of this book in action in one of the London parks.



Gabriella Contu, probably inspired by this story or by some film that deals with youth themes, thus presents in Vendetta in disguise this group of armed and masked teenagers, who terrorize and rob park-goers with their raids. They are children left to themselves, united by the only strength of their group that imposes a series of rules to be accepted. A bit like The Lord of the Flies, with the hierarchy of the case. But in order to be welcomed into the group and follow the rules, are they also willing to kill? It seems like no. So who is the author of a series of brutal murders that begin to occur?

It's up to Dylan to investigate, once he is "hired" by the pack. And that was to be expected.

Because, you see, net of the title of the register that clearly spoilers and makes the epilogue of the story very predictable, the one staged by the still talented Contu in Vendetta in mask is a story with little bite and without any twist, cliffhanger and other recurring little things in the stories of the tenant of Craven Road. But let's go in order.

Dylan is once again at the mercy of events, the one he does to exonerate little Sam - first suspect of the group on the murders, it cannot even be called an investigation, despite the old boy has come to the inspector's rescue ... oops, sorry, Superintendent Bloch (an oversight that did not go unnoticed ed). The yellow is resolved almost by chance and in complete autonomy, we would dare to say, cutting out monsters and potential murderous spirits. Even the absence of Rania, Carpenter (being a purely "natural" and detective case) and of Groucho, who is not present in the entire register (!), Weighs heavily.

Let's admit, however, that the real horror protagonist of this story, he managed to touch some chords so dear to our investigator.

Goodbye cruel adolescence

As already mentioned, the real horror de Vendetta in disguise is adolescence and how in this delicate phase of our life the very young manage to be really very cruel.

In this story Dylan once again takes the side of the marginalized (the herd that lives in the London park), supports them and the story that reveals the culprit refers directly to a sad episode of bullying and psychological violence.

It is a real "horror" to have a desperate need to feel accepted and what you get is just mockery. And this happens, most of the time, right in the course of our adolescence, while our body is transformed and we are still full of insecurities. A section of the register that, as happened in the past, did not leave us indifferent at all.



The tables are by Andrea Chella, who previously landed in the Dylan Dog Maxi series (The man and the beast in number 31, as the curator himself points out), an artist who overseas managed to be appreciated in Dark Horse publications for the Star Wars series. Yet, in this book the author has certainly returned a very personal trait, but often approximate and not very expressive. Gigi Cavenago opens the register with a very representative cover of the story that follows. Not one of his best covers, but still very well done.



Even the books of just a year ago, where the nightmare investigator was partly upset, seem long gone, but he convinced and intrigued in his mini cycle 666 which began with The Black Dawn. What can we expect in the coming months?

Dear returning and aficionados from the Craven Road area,

Friday 9 April at 21:00 on the sportsgaming.win Italia Pop Culture Twitch channel, we will talk about Dylan Dog, from Vendetta in mask just arrived on newsstands, but there will be other surprises for all horror lovers!

https://www.twitch.tv/culturapopita

Don't miss it!



The new hardcover edition of Dylan Dog. Planet of the Dead Just Arrived on Amazon!