Channel Awesome
Register
Advertisement
Silent Hill: Dead/Alive #1 and 2
Released
October 4th, 2010
Running time
30:57
Previous review
Next review
Tagline
There was a Silent Hill comic here. It's gone now. Nah, just kidding – there's nothing related to Silent Hill in this thing.
Link

(Open on Linkara standing in front a black background, with eerie music playing in the background)

Linkara: Once upon a time, there was a little girl who lived in a quiet little town with her mother and father.

(Cut to an eerie silhouette drawing of a girl and her parents walking along together)

Linkara (v/o): She was a happy child, and she loved her mother and father, just as all little children do. She knew of some of the more... unpleasant aspects of the world, but she didn't care, for she loved her mother and father, and they loved her back.

Linkara: At least, that's what she thought, for you see, her parents did not love her because she was their daughter. They loved her because of what they planned to do with her. They worshiped a great and powerful god, and they loved their god more than their daughter...

(AT4W title sequence plays; no title card in this episode, oddly enough)

Linkara: (seated on his futon) Hello, and welcome to Atop the Fourth Wall, where bad comics burn. Say, remember "Silent Hill: Dying Inside"? Well, guess what, (holds up another "Silent Hill" comic) there's a sequel.

(A montage of shots of Linkara's review of the "Silent Hill: Dying Inside" miniseries is shown)

Linkara (v/o) So yeah, a year ago, I had the "honor" of reviewing "Silent Hill: Dying Inside", a comic that tells you exactly how you'll feel after reading it. The plot goes like this: A little girl named Christabella is murdered in Silent Hill, and somehow she becomes a demonic ghost that trying to... I have no idea. She seems to want to bring more people to the town to be consumed, but for what reason, I couldn't tell you. Her sister, Lauryn, armed with a magic book she bought off of eBay...

Linkara: (irritably) And yes, a year later, I am still bugged by that!

Linkara (v/o): ...brings a whole bunch of cannon fodder teenagers to the town under the pretense of a business venture, but instead wants them all to die so she can have an army of zombies under her command, to fight the monsters of the town, and free her sister's soul. Because bringing people to die makes her such a likeable protagonist. To compound matters, and to make them all the dumber and more nonsensical, we must also contend with Dr. Troy Abernathy, a former psychiatrist who got stuck in the town and had no significant contribution to the plot, yet somehow had the first freaking issues devoted to him! And on top of all of that, apparently a version of Silent Hill's resident cult was also around, led by a mysterious man named What-ley, and I know I'm supposed to pronounce it "Whate-ley" after the minor character from one H.P Lovecraft story, but screw that, this doesn't deserve proper pronunciation! Anyway, the story ended stupidly with Lauryn somehow figuring out she had the power of Grayskull, and she was gonna watch over the town...

(Cut to a clip of an episode of Doctor Who)

Linkara (v/o): ...and the Doctor said that if we fight like animals, we'll die like animals...

(Cut to a clip of an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, showing Captain Picard playing poker with the Enterprise crew)

Linkara (v/o): ...and Captain Picard played poker with the rest of the cast– what, what? Oh, sorry, my mind kinda drifted off there to better places.

(Cut back to the Silent Hill comic)

Linkara (v/o): I don't understand this at all. Scott Ciencin, the writer, wrote almost all of the Silent Hill comics! The only exception I can find is "Silent Hill: Sinner's Reward", and guess what? THAT ONE DOESN'T SUCK!! Why did they keep handing this crap to him? "Sinner's Reward" got cut back by an issue, because no one trusted Silent Hill comics anymore to buy them! Instead, we got at least thirteen freaking stories that had nothing to do with the games outside of random references to them!

Linkara: So with all that, let's dig into (holds up today's comic) "Salient Heel: Dead/Alive #1" and "#2". (beat) What? It ain't Silent Hill, so why should I call it that?

(Cut to footage of the Silent Hill video games)

Linkara (v/o): But what is Silent Hill? Well, just look back at last year's review and I explain it. If you're a lazy jerk, then it's an evil town that likes to stab at symbolism into you while playing with your head. And there isn't a Christabella anywhere in Silent Hill!

(Cut to a shot of Christabella from the Silent Hill movie adaptation)

Linkara (v/o): THAT DOESN'T COUNT!

(Cut to shots of the covers of the first two issues of "Silent Hill: Dead/Alive")

Linkara (v/o): We're not looking at the covers this time around since I'm reading from the trade, but I will say they're definitely improved from last year. We actually have some genuinely disturbing imagery, though a lot of it is ruined by friggin' Christabella's ugly noggin shoved into them. Oh, and then there's our title: "Dead/Alive". Great, we got the Schrodinger's cat of comic books here.

(Cut to an image of Schrodinger's cat)

Linkara (v/o): Speaking of, I never understood that, the cat isn't both dead and alive, it's one or the other. We can't just see which one it is. It's like saying because I can't remember if I turned a light on or off in another room, the light exists in a state of both on and off. Yeah, try explaining that on your electricity bill: "No, you see, the light was both on and off, so you should only charge me half of this."

Linkara: And yes, I know this has nothing to do with the comic; I'm trying to put off talking about this thing for as long as I can.

(Cut to Iron Liz sitting in a corner, reading a book of her own)

Iron Liz: Oh, yeah, you never go off on wild tangents on your show.

Linkara: Oh, whatever!

Linkara (v/o): We open to Christabella and some random human silhouettes standing over a bleeding guy.

Christabella: You're confused. Desperate. Terrified.

Linkara: (annoyed) YES.

Christabella: You don't understand what's happening. Are you awake? Are you dreaming?

Linkara: (smiling) Are you making a suggestion? Because I'll gladly go to sleep right now.

Christabella: Is this hell?

Linkara: (annoyed again) Almost certainly.

Christabella: What are all these things? Why do they want to strip your skin off, chew on your guts, and hollow out your skull?

Linkara: They need better hobbies?

Christabella: Why do I think that's funny?

(Cut to the MST3K gang watching Teenage Crime Wave)

Tom Servo: I know, let's play the "quiet game"!

(Cut back to the comic)

Linkara (v/o): By the way, Christabella's eye has returned, even though in "Dying Inside", it got shot out. Now, one might think that it's just the artist making a goof, but we later see that Christabella can change her appearance. If that's the case, then why the hell does she always appear as an annoying little girl with a wound in her stomach? If you're a demonic entity, aren't there, like, thousands of other forms you could take instead? Anyway, Christabella feels the need to monologue to us about Silent Hill, even though the only people who would actually interested in a comic like this would be Silent Hill fans.

Christabella: (narrating) A long time ago, longer than all the time I've been dead, Silent Hill was overrun with life. Happy, disgusting, pathetic lives... It was a romantic getaway, a good place to raise the kids.

Linkara: You know, frankly, I've played Silent Hill 2 now, and gone through the place. Silent Hill is a rat-hole of a town, and I sincerely doubt that anyone had fun even before the demons got there.

Christabella: (narrating) A place that made you think of Jimmy Stewart, and angels, and how wonderful life could be.

(Cut to a clip of Silent Hill 2: the scene where James and Maria first meet)

Maria: So, the hotel was your "special place", huh? I bet it was.

(Editor's note: "Yeah, THAT makes me think of Jimmy Stewart.")

Maria: Don't get so mad...

(Back to the comic again)

Christabella: (narrating) Some people fixed all of that.

Linkara: (as Christabella) They were called the government.

Linkara (v/o): The artwork has devolved into grade school classes just learning perspective drawing. Oh, and hey, look, a famous Silent Hill monster: Trapezoid Head!

Christabella: (narrating) And me? I'm God here.

Linkara: (rubbing his temples, miserably) Remember when Silent Hill was scary? Yeah, those were good times.

Christabella: (narrating) Now it's time to open that yummy-nummy rainbow inside your belly and see what you had for–

Linkara: (depressed) I've got this horrible feeling that whatever the hell that sentence meant, that's about as coherent as it's gonna get.

Linkara (v/o): All of the sudden, Christabella wakes up... and everything's monochrome now. Yeah, because obviously in her dreams, it's important that everything be hideously brown when the real world is hideously gray. But yeah, Christabella wakes up, and someone drives her away to get to "school". I'm guessing it's our womanizing pal, Troy Abernathy here, not that the comic bothers to tell us what the Sam Hill just happened! We cut to the small town of Ashton, Vermont, where we meet Connie Mills.

Connie's diary: If you're reading this, shame on you. A girl's diary is private.

Linkara (v/o): Okay, I admit, that does get a chuckle out of me, if only because since comics stopped using thought balloons, I've wondered where the hell some of these first-person narrative caption boxes are supposed to be coming from.

Connie's diary: I'm just your average girl. I work at a health care clinic. I collect bugs...

Linkara: Yeah, just like any small town girl that works at a health clinic. (beat) Wait...

Connie's diary: One time, I loved someone so much, I think it cost me a piece of my soul.

Linkara: (rubbing temple) Urgh! Insert your own Twilight joke here!

(Cut to Harvey Finevoice standing by)

Harvey: What, you ain't even gonna try, kid?

Linkara: I could, but what would be the point? It's just getting old now.

Linkara (v/o): Connie runs into that annoying old lady that anyone might run into at a supermarket who won't shut their gob. In this case, she's talking about some up and coming Hollywood star named Kenneth Carter, who can't keep it in his pants. However, it hits Connie a little close to home since apparently, she used to know Ken, and naturally, despite Connie clearly not wanting to talk about it, the old lady just keeps flapping her jaw and asking if Ken's penis is really as big as people say it is. Naturally, the grocery store they are at starts fading into the other-world of Silent Hill, with the words "Empty Vessel" scrawled in everywhere, which is what happens, I'm sure, to anyone who is trapped with an annoying person who needs to be yelled at. Connie is suddenly grabbed from behind by some muscular specter, but the old lady doesn't see any of it until Connie vanishes. And scrawled for no reason on the ground is: "Silent Hill". What is the town leaving its autograph after taking its victims, now? Back in the hill, Christabella is forced to go through a badly drawn existence of a happy town, where the teacher mocks her for not having any power, and a little kid tells her about puppies and finger painting. Yeah, this is all supposed to be some happy-go-lucky dreamland, but if that's the case, why the hell is everything so depressingly brown and gray?! On the way home, she wants to go see a dead body nailed to a wall with the words, "Attack tourists? See what you get – Lauryn's Law", written next to it.

Linkara: So Lauryn, the psychotic jerk from "Dying Inside" has become a tyrant of Silent Hill since last we saw her. WHO'S SURPRISED??

Christabella: (narrating) Lauryn did this. Did all of this. Turned Silent Hill into an f-ing greeting card.

Linkara: Yeah, a greeting card with a rotting corpse attached to the wall.

Linkara (v/o): The little demon girl whom nobody cares about but the writer looks out the window to see Lauryn making out with some random guy. So... what, are there other people in Silent Hill? Is that her boyfriend she tossed out of town? What?! That night, Christabella wakes up to discover the mists of Silent Hill returning, much to her glee. She leaves her room seeing Troy unconscious. She can't get to Lauryn, whose room is chained up similarly to the titular room of "Silent Hill 4: The Room". (laughs) Random Silent Hill references that make no sense! It's like Scott Ciencin desperately jumping up and down and yelling, "See? SEE?! This is Silent Hill, and not just some dumb horror story that I made up, but no one wanted to publish, because it doesn't make any sense!" Christabella walks outside and sees some demons. She calls out to them, hoping to get them to break down Lauryn's door, but... then it bites her... apparently. I'm only guessing because all we see is this shot from behind with the demon at least five feet away, then a shot of Christabella turning her head and yelling that it bit her, and then a shot of her arm.

Christabella: I've got a freakin' pulse!

Linkara: (smiling smugly) Ohhh? (giggles)

Christabella: I don't want to be a real girl!

Linkara (v/o): Wait a second, this is suggesting that Christabella is alive again and can be hurt? You're saying we can see Christabella in pain??

Linkara: Huh, I don't know what it is, but I'm suddenly enjoying this story a lot more.

Linkara (v/o): We cut to... uh, three silhouettes with intestines hanging out, and a guy in a car that's slowly being engulfed by water. Oh, wait, it's a movie, and this is that Kenneth Carter guy they mentioned earlier. Anyway, Ken here is talking to his non-supportive, drug-addled, jerk of a girlfriend when his dog comes running up.

Ken: What is it, Bear? How's the good puppy?

Linkara: Who names their dog "Bear"? (turns to see his teddy bear) Oh, hai, doggy!

(Cut close to the bear with the sound of children laughing creepily in the background, shocking Linkara)

Linkara: ...the hell?

Linkara (v/o): Ken also has a series of disturbing paintings, also of something straight out of a lovecraft story. Why does he have them?

Ken: You never know what's real and what isn't here in Hollywood. In this town, these are like... society's restraints all stripped away, what people are, stripped bare, not good, not evil... just instinct.

Linkara: So, our instincts are hideously demonic skulls, breasts in the shape of spirals, and half of our heads cut off? You know, maybe you've spent far too much time in Hollywood.

Linkara (v/o): Ken gets a phone call from a private investigator firm that he's hired to find his parents, since he doesn't know who they were. However, they've called him to let him know about Connie's disappearance. And why would this investigation firm that was hunting his parents call him about Connie? He starts packing, and the girlfriend, who was doing lines of coke during the phone call – I can see why he decided to stick with her and not Connie – rants at him about how she's just a bimbo, whereas he only cares about Connie. Then, the girlfriend turns into a demonic apparition without a face. We cut back to Christabella who has beaten some demon dogs with a tire iron. Here's a dumb question: if Christabella can feel pain now, how come that injury to her stomach isn't killing her right now? She runs into an antique store for safety, but instead finds some unseen demonic force.

Demonic Force: You did some very bad things, Christabella. You opposed the order. You tried to take our god's power as your own. Bad girls get punished. If they're lucky. Brats, we just dispose of.

Linkara: (excitedly putting down comic) Ooh, hang on a second! Let me get some popcorn! (runs off)

Christabella: WAIT! I... Let's deal.

(Linkara grudgingly gets back on his futon with a sour look on his face and picks up the comic again)

Linkara: (sighs) I hate this comic.

Linkara (v/o): Back at Ken's house of crazy, he's washing his face and trying to convince himself that what he saw wasn't real, but then sees his eyes are bleeding, only that it's actually just on the mirror.

Ken: The mirror's... bleeding. The walls are meat. The world is meat.

Linkara (v/o): Hey, finally something Silent Hill-esque disturbing! Let's see how we can ruin it by not making any sense. All of a sudden, there's this thing made out of meat and tentacles that's vaguely humanoid. Is it the walls? Is it his mirror image? I have no idea, because now we see Ken kicking something. I think the implication is that he kicked his mirror and went straight through it. Why does he have a big space behind his mirror?

Ken: We're all just meat in this town. Hey, f-face, ever wonder if a glass dagger could cut your head clean off?

Linkara: (gruff voice) What? No! I never wondered that. Why would I...?

(A slicing sound is heard; cut to a clip of Knightmare)

Treyguard: Ooooh! Nasty!

(Back to the comic again)

Ken: My house... What's happened to my house?

Linkara: Yeah, I don't think you'll be able to paint over that, dude.

Linkara (v/o): All of his paintings have vanished, replaced with bright white lights. His dog leaps through one of them as if it was a portal, and a woman appears walking up to him.

Ken: Jess...?

Woman: Lenora.

Ken: But this... all this...

Lenora: Oh, yes, you don't know what's real. Whether you're awake or dreaming.

(Cut to a clip of The Matrix)

Morpheus: Have you ever had a dream, Neo, that you were so sure was real?

(Back to the comic once again)

Lenora: In ways, your normal way of being, and what makes you so perfect right now. Alive. Dead. One and the same.

Linkara (v/o): Yyyyeah, not really, no matter how much you try to wax philosophical.

Lenora: You want to find your darling Connie, don't you? The one bit of truth you've ever known in a world of lies.

Linkara: You know, if this was actually anything like Silent Hill, the next four issues would be Ken walking around town asking, "Have you seen a girl around here somewhere? (raises hand over his hand) She's about this tall."

Linkara (v/o): Anyway, Lenora tells him that something new is coming to make the world bleed, and she is its messenger, and that the one she works for has a part for him to play.

Lenora: There you are now. Or as you will be when we're through with you. A little peroxide, the right wardrobe, some contacts, a little insight, your next big role. The blond-haired, blue-eyed, blood-stained, boy next door. The deep thinker. The killer with Nietzsche in one hand, an axe in the other.

Linkara: (as Lenora) Tim Burton is producing. We already got Johnny Depp lined up to play a deranged cartoon rabbit. The working title is, That Which Does Not Kill You. Meryl Streep plays the president.

Linkara (v/o): Oh, looky, another random Silent Hill reference: the Twin Victims demon from Silent Hill 4. Moving on then. So Lenora has the demons take him. One wonders how beings that walk on their only two hands pull that off, but hey, whatcha gonna do? And so, our comic ends with Ken suddenly finding himself in Silent Hill where Christabella pretends to be an innocent little girl asking for his help, plus a bunny doll to hide the big stomach wound on her that's still there for some reason. Aaaand her eye is bleeding just like Lenora's. Let's try to explain that, shall we? Issue 2 begins, at least in the individual comic, with a bullcrap narration on the cover page that explains the plot so far.

Narrator: Scheming to take back all the power that was once her's, and more, Christabella strikes a bargain with Lenora, a witch who now molds and shapes the fate of Silent Hill in place of Christabella's big sister Lauryn.

Linkara: (confused) When the hell did that happen? I thought Christabella was talking to a representative of the Order! You know, that cult that's responsible for all the demonic crap in Silent Hill? The thing that made for a much more interesting story than this one?!

Ken: (narrating) I walked through a painting of a place that's not supposed to exist and found myself in a nightmare.

Linkara: Please, he's a Hollywood actor; he probably sees this kind of crap six times on the way to his trailer.

Ken: I have blood and crap on me from a monster I kicked and carved to death in my own bathroom – a room that was somehow turned to meat from floor to ceiling.

Linkara: (as Ken) And it dripped on my hand, so, YUCK!

Linkara (v/o): Anyway, we see images of Ken's dog running around and chasing a butterfly, until it runs into a monster with a Cthulu face. Seriously, Scott Ciencin, if you wanted to write Lovecraft so damn much, why didn't you just freakin' write Lovecraft?! The dog kinda barks and sniffs at the monster, which leaks blood before proclaiming that it will eat it alive. Why are the monsters talking?

Monster: Dog not... afraid? Want... beef jerky? Ugh... Alright... have... beef... jerkey. [sic]

(Linkara stares at the comic confusingly)

Linkara: Huh. I think I like this new comic better.

Linkara (v/o): Seriously, "Demon and Dog"! I can see Spielberg attached to this. Ken and Christabella go out into the streets where tons of demons are walking around, looking at them, but ignoring them.

Ken: What is this place?

Christabella: I... I'm not sure. Hell, maybe?

Linkara: Rotting corpses walking around, everything looks decayed... Probably Los Angeles.

Linkara (v/o): While the monsters aren't attacking them yet, he wants to go someplace safe before they decide to.

Ken: (narrating) I know the dangers that wait inside them. From my dreams...

Linkara (v/o): Hi, Trapezoid Head!

Ken: (narrating) From Ike's paintings.

Linkara: Okay, confession time. To my irritation, this is not just a sequel to "Dying Inside". You see, there were three other Silent Hill comics in between "Dying Inside" and "Dead/Alive".

(Cut to shots of those comics)

Linkara (v/o): "Among the Damned", "Paint It Black", and "The Grinning Man". Guess how many of them actually had something to do with Silent Hill? NONE OF THEM!! They were all written by Scott Ciencin, too! I admit, I haven't read them, myself, but apparently they feature the Whateley guy or some bullcrap like that! From what I can tell, the only one that actually has some significance here is "Paint It Black", which is about an artist named Ike, who created vivid paintings of the horrors of Silent Hill and traveled into the paintings to get into the town and back again. And again, these may have been decent enough horror stories on their own, if they, one, didn't have the Silent Hill label on them, and two, actually made a damn bit of SENSE!

(Cut back to "Dead/Alive")

Linkara (v/o): Back to our story already in progress, Ken narrates about how part of him loves Silent Hill.

Ken: I knew it represented truth. A brutal, terrible truth. It's honest.

(Cut to a clip from Silent Hill 3, showing Heather talking to Vincent)

Heather: Are you talking to me about the monsters?

Vincent: Monsters? They looked like monsters to you?

(Heather gasps)

Linkara: (smiling) Yeah, see, this is what happens when you just read a monster list on Wikipedia, instead of actually learning about the damn games!!

Linkara (v/o): The two pop into a nearby convenient... uh... something, I think it's a theater. Ken starts rifling through a whole bunch of papers to discover his own birth certificate, and photos of himself as a kid, and also his real name before being put up for adoption: Joshua Reynolds. Well, whoop-de-crap! That has no significance whatsoever! Christabella feigns being hurt so she doesn't have to keep hiding the wound, but apparently the blood is dried. I'm sorry, comic, but you can't get away with this. Either she's still injured or she isn't! If she isn't, and it's an illusion, then why the hell does she bother with a blood-stained dress?! We saw her bleeding out the eyes earlier, so obviously, she could affect her appearance! In the distraction caused by Christabella, all the files they discovered vanish.

Linkara: (feigned alarm) Oh, no, the meaningless, plot cul-de-sac is over! Now they actually have to do something!

Linkara (v/o): They wander into an auditorium full of zombies and nurse demons, and Lenora talks to Christabella to remind her of their deal that they apparently had. The curtains are pulled aside, and a newsreel starts.

(Newsreel music plays)

Newsreel Announcer: World of the Future! So here you are, cruising down Santa Monica, not a care in the world. Then a complete (beep)wad cuts you off and nearly forced you off the road! Do you chase after him and try to get even? Pull your 9mm and splatter his brains? No need! Look at him now. Laughing, acting like he got away with it. But, gee, what's that bearing down on him from up above? Plan for dealing with all this garbage–and we think you'll like it!

Linkara: Yeah, by the way, the only reason that this pointless bit is funny is because I added the music.

Ken: What is this...?

Christabella: The future.

Linkara: (as Christabella) In the future, we're all gonna have personal hell squids to kill people who annoy us. And our own personal jet packs on the moon.

Linkara (v/o): Anyway the film tries to convince Ken to become a psycho-killer for some reason... and Connie appears on the screen.... but the image starts to decay as it keeps talking. Meanwhile, back in the real world, Ken's agent shows up at his place and finds his girlfriend with an axe through her head, and writing in blood on the walls. However, unless it says...

(Cut to a clip of a Silent Hill game, showing said message written in blood on the wall)

Linkara (v/o): ..."IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE", I do not care about what it says.

(Back to the comic again)

Linkara (v/o): Ken gets shown that it was done to make it look like he killed her, but Ken then realizes that it isn't really Connie talking to him, but Lenora in disguise. OH, MY GOD! And then she dresses in a kitchen rug and like a nun for some reason. Oh, goody, Troy shows up. Hey, Troy, I see you still got tentacle chest hairs. You should really have someone look at that. Lenora isn't worried about it, but is curious since she thought anything related to Lauren had been wiped from the town.

Linkara: (irritably) I wish everything that was related to this junk was gone.

Linkara (v/o): If I haven't made this clear yet, allow me to do so: THIS IS NOT SCARY!!! And for a horror comic, the intention is to SCARE US!! The artwork is terrible and the inks are so heavy that I can barely distinguish the horrific imagery. And it kinda undermines your hideous creature if it befriends a dog and gives it beef jerky! This is painful and boring! No one cares about these people! Why does Lenora give a crap about some random actor in Hollywood being a killer?! What the hell happened to Lauryn?! Why is Christabella still around, and how did she strike a deal with Lenora?! What could she possibly offer to her when we see that even Lenora can change her appearance and could have just acted as Christabella, as if having her interact with Ken was in any way important to their plans?!? Troy says that Ken should be killed, too, for some reason, and meanwhile, our true protagonist – the dog – comes across some liquor dogs from Silent Hill 4. Anyway, back to the Moron Brigade: Troy explains that the people in the theater are actually nothing but "memories" from a time before Silent Hill went to hell.

Linkara: (annoyed) Nobody was asking, Troy!

Linkara (v/o): All of a sudden, I guess the Trapezoid Heads attack Troy... I think, since we just randomly cutting to Lenora, the demons, the suddenly to this panel where they're fighting, and Ken is talking.

Ken: Christabella, the Pyramid Heads, they're slowing him down. We've got to run!

Linkara (v/o): (angrily) One, that is not a freakin' pyramid! At best, it is a wedge! I should probably be calling them door-stopper heads. Two, how do you even know to call them Pyramid Heads?! Three, how are they slowing him down?! His tentacle chest hairs seem to be moving around just fine! Four, I really, REALLY hate this comic!!

Christabella: Doctor Troy... you're dead.

Troy: Yes. You killed me. I was a noted psychiatrist. I had a life.

Linkara: Dude, I read "Dying Inside". You did not.

Christabella: I'm feeling something deep inside. Almost like a gift. Or a family inheritance. I guess I had to be alive to get it.

Lenora: Your sister's power– NO!

Linkara (v/o): Aaaand Christabella makes Troy explode, I guess. Oh, yeah, I remember, Lauren supposedly had super-duper magical powers at the end of "Dying Inside" to fight demons. It makes about as much sense now as it did then. Troy's still alive, but Christabella prepares to use her powers to attack Lenora, but she collapses, worn out from the sudden use of her maxi-extreme, ultra-super, flower-power things that she has now. Ken carries Christabella out, Lenora saying not to because she's irredeemable, but since Ken says that she's afraid of Christabella, that's a good enough reason to help her. However, as they get outside, they're confronted by a bunch of demons. Christabella's too exhausted to use her newfound abilities, meaning that their screwed. And so, our comic ends with the arrival of Ike Issacs – real imaginative parents there – the painter guy I mentioned, carrying a bunch of guns and surrounded by our hero, the dog, and the demon dogs from earlier.

Ike: Anyhoo, this hot goth chick with, like, a smokin' mohawk sent me to help. Great kisser, seriously... And I found your dog. And his pals. So... what's say we (beep) these things up, grab your girlfriend, give what for to that bitch Lenora, then find a way out of here?

Linkara: (rubbing his face in disgust) You know, Phelous says that American developers didn't understand the series when they made Silent Hill: Homecoming. But man, they didn't have anything on THIS! (holding up comic)

Ike: Groovy.

Linkara: (stunned; dangerously) You did not... just... do that...

Ike: Groovy.

(Linkara is stunned again, his face twitching)

Linkara: (whispering) Excuse me for a moment...

(He gets up and walks out of the room, where he yells and screams raging gibberish offscreen for several seconds, then he storms back in, snatches up the comic again and takes in a deep breath before letting it all out)

Linkara (v/o): (yelling) THIS IS ONE OF THE WORST COMICS I'VE EVER READ IN MY LIFE!! AND THAT LINE RIGHT THERE SHOWS WHY!! SCOTT CIENCEN IS AN IDIOT WHO RIPPED OFF ONE OF THE GREATEST LINES OF THE EVIL DEAD MOVIES!! NO, THAT IS NOT AN HOMAGE TO IT, SINCE SUCH A LINE, IN THIS CONTEXT, IN THIS FRANCHISE, HAS NO PLACE HERE!!! THE ARTWORK IS TERRIBLE, WITH UNFINISHED BACKGROUNDS, MURKY COLORING, AND CONFUSING STORYTELLING! THE STORY ITSELF IS FULL OF HOLES AND MAKES LESS SENSE THAN LAST YEAR'S NONSENSE, AND I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT NOBODY, NOT A SINGLE PERSON AT IDW PUBLISHING BOTHERED TO SLAP THIS MORON AND HIRE SOMEONE WHO KNEW WHAT THEY WERE DOING!!!!!

Linkara: AND CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT THERE ARE THREE MORE ISSUES TO GO?!?!

Iron Liz: Well, you picked them out.

Harvey: Really is his own fault.

Linkara: Would you people put a sock in it?! I–

(Suddenly, he is interrupted by the door opening and Pollo coming in)

Pollo: I heard screaming. Are you okay?

Linkara: I would if people stopped interrupting me!

Pollo: What people?

Linkara: (pointing behind him) THEM!

(He turns toward Liz and Harvey, only to find that they have disappeared)

Pollo: Linkara, you've been here alone all day.

(Linkara tries to make sense of the situation, before staring into the camera confused)

(End credits roll)

So whatever happened to Hogg? Is he still in the town?

And yes, my no extreme-swearing policy still extends to these comics. Christabella swears enough as it is; do you really want MORE?

Future events such as these will affect you in the future.

A lot of Silent Hill 4 references in this one, oddly enough.

(Stinger: A clip from Evil Dead II is shown, showing Ash and Henrietta, the latter superimposed with a copy of the Silent Hill comic)

Henrietta: Hey! I'll swallow your soul! I'll swallow your soul!

Ash: (aiming his gun at Henrietta) Swallow this. (shoots Henrietta, and by extension, the comic, with it)

(end)

Advertisement