’30 Days of Night': Read It Before you Watch It!

Written by Steve Niles with artwork by Ben Templesmith

The story is set in Barrow, Alaska, during the northern winter, which is a time that apparently leaves Barrow in total darkness for the period of 30 days. Vampires attack the town, killing everyone they come across and feeding. That's pretty much the premise; although development of the story proves to have much more to it, and to the characters involved. Sorry, no spoilers!

I was not fortunate enough to have caught the 2002 series by IDW Publishing, to my very great regret; however, was fortunate enough to read the recently reprinted graphic novel, and I have to say I was impressed. Let me clarify what that means -- I tend to hate vampire stories, because I feel they are over-used monster types and I feel that there is rarely anything unusual or different enough about the stories to make them entertaining. That makes it extremely difficult to get me interested in your latest take on the vampire ideal."30 Days of Night" was totally entertaining. It was unusual and engaging, which is a rare and precious thing. I mean, if I were a vampire I'd want to go where there was an enclosed area full of food and no sun for long periods of time so I could feast for 30 days and not worry about being hassled or killed by that pesky sunrise/sunset thing. I can appreciate the mentality there, even though I feel that there were some areas of the story that could have been explained more fully.

Templesmith's artwork was, of course, excellent; although I now fear that the same objections I had to the lack of blood in "300" will have to be re-iterated when the feature film is released on the 19th. 'Cause I mean, let's face it - the blood has to go somewhere, even if it looks great as art, it should not just vanish into thin air when it exits the body. Bloody desires aside, I'm hoping to see in the film exactly what I observed in the book -- fun and gore with some interesting characters thrown in for good measure.

Watch for it: Sheriff Eben Olemaun - a great character that made me like him, much the way that Vin Diesel affected me in "Pitch Black" -- didn't think I'd like him, wasn't really looking to like him, but ended up really really glad to have met him, if for no reason other than that he made the story more fun for me.