Alan Hewetson

« If you don’t go over the top you can’t see what’s on the other side. » — Jim Steinman

On this blog — and these several past countdowns — I haven’t devoted much attention to the 1970s Skywald “Horror-Mood” line, mostly because it doesn’t often catch my fancy. My idea, my sense of Hallowe’en — and horror — is rather moodier and/or more whimsical, more innocent than the strain of the weird gathering momentum by the dawn of the decade, as exemplified by the Skywald line.

But what makes this entry an exception? Well, this thing’s so enthusiastically bombastic that it’s hard to take seriously. Yet the craft on display is tough to deny. Courtesy of Messrs Alan Hewetson, writer (also the rag’s editor) and Jesús Durán Castillo, illustrator, “13” is a messy patchwork of dangling bits purloined from Ambrose Bierce‘s An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, Edgar Allan Poe‘s The Pit and the Pendulum, and (what the heck) traditional French-Canadian folk song Dans la prison de Londres (Hewetson’s Canadian, let’s not forget). It’s also a jaunty, bracing scamper on the bonkers side, a wild ride on the escalating, circular chain of delusional obsession. Buckle up!