Sunday, July 14, 2013

'Contagious' by Charles Burns from Taboo No. 1

'Contagious' by Charles Burns 
from Taboo No. 1


‘Taboo’ was a black and white horror comic anthology, nine issues of which were published, in trade paperback format, by Steve Bissette from 1988 to 1995.

Bissette saw the magazine less as a promising commercial venture (which it wasn’t), but rather, as an outlet for creativity otherwise not available to many of the artists and writers working for the major comic book companies. As well, there was a dearth of horror comics being published in the late 80s, and Bissette saw Taboo as filling a void.

Issue One, from Fall 1988, was something of a mixed bag. There were a number of worthy entries, as well as some real duds........I’ll be posting the better strips on a periodic basis. 


Leading off, is a nice little gem from Charles Burns, titled ‘Contagious’. This four-pager is a prequel of sorts to the enormously successful ‘Black Hole’ series that Burns would launch seven years later in 1995. 




2 comments:

Will Errickson said...

*Loved* TABOO, got 'em when they came out, man were they disturbing. Definitely some clunkers in there but that had to be expected. Burns's contribution definitely was a fave!

Anonymous said...

How can it be a "prequel" if it came out first? The word you're looking for is "precursor"