In Review: Elvira: Mistress Of The Dark #1

Synopsis: The Mistress of the Dark has become unstuck in time! Elvira crashes Mary Shelley’s monster weekend, beginning an epic journey through horror history, stalked by the most terrifying nightmare to ever walk the Earth.

Review: Dynamite continues its mission to mine popular culture of the 70’s and 80’s and this time it is the turn of Mistress of late night Horror Elvira. To write and illustrate this comic we see the team of David Avallone and Dave Acosta reunited. The two previously worked on Doc Savage.

Elvira Mistress of the Dark is a character that has always been a natural fit for comics. From her introduction as a hostess for late night, horror shows in the 80’s to her films in the latter part of the 80’s and early 90’s. She has always come across as a fun character with all the sexual innuendoes.

This first issue sees Elvira share an adventure with Frankenstein writer Mary Shelley the dialogue is quick and fast and Avalone has tons of fun with the difference in culture and language when Elvira is mixing with Shelley and her friends while evading a monster who desperately wants his two brides.

The beginning of the comic sees Elvira on a film set where her co-star tells her, “You’re so hot you melted my dentures.” This is only one such funny line from the book.

Where Avallone has the most fun is when he has Elvira break the fourth wall when she asked readers what variant they got as well as comments about fans wishing it was a film instead of a comic so they could see her run in slow-mo.

Dave Ocosta’s artwork in this first issue is brilliant. I loved how he transitions from a film set to England of the 19th century where we meet Mary Shelley. The sequences where Shelley and Elvira are being chased by the monster are particularly noteworthy.

Overall. This is a great first issue, which sets the premise up well and ends on a cliffhanger that will have fans eating their shorts for an entire month. Dave Avallone as always brings some fantastic dialogue to his take on Elvira who is every bit as witty as his take on Battie Page.