Five Ghosts: The Haunting of Fabian Gray #3 Review

by wileypeach

 

Describing the first three issues of Five Ghosts: The Haunting of Fabian Gray (the tale of a treasure hunter possessed by five literary specters) has been giving me a fair amount of trouble. I could say it‘s the most fantastic love letter to 1950s era adventure films to come out since the Indiana Jones trilogy (yes, trilogy) but that wouldn’t get across the pure delight of imagination that’s being poured into every issue of this wonderful comic by writer Frank J. Barbiere and artist Chris Mooneyham. It wouldn’t hint towards the large fantasy aspects that surround the whole story or the buddy-cop style dialogue between the protagonists as they dart off to foreign lands in search of adventure and answers.

If there are any negative aspects it’s that those 1950s adventure films did bring the silent and strong lead man cliché back up with his reincarnation as Fabian Gray, whose motivations can seem vague at times. Truly though, in a world where inventive ideas are thrown in and then brushed aside for something newer, Gray’s stone face almost seems like a port in the imaginative storm.

Five Ghosts: The Haunting of Fabian Gray is the best and the pulpiest of pulp fiction and while it might be difficult to describe, issue #3 only makes the stakes higher and the world richer. What I can tell you is this; do yourself a favor and go buy this issue and the previous two is you haven’t already.

 

8.5

 

Wiley Peach

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