‘Plunge’ – Hill, Immonen, Stewart (Hill House Comics, DC Black Label)

 


Page Count: 168 Pages

Newsagents everywhere hate me for this but I’ve got a habit of saving winning scratch-cards and cashing them in en masse. Luckily for all concerned, it’s only a problem when I have a run of good luck ;o)

A bit of an odd way to open a post here then but essentially, that’s what led me to ‘Plunge’; a small run of winning scratch-cards and a need to be out of my ex’s house for a bit. Well, more like the eldest cats need for me to be out of my ex’s house for a bit, I’m considerate like that ;o) I love some horror, in my comic book reading, and while I’d never heard of ‘Plunge’, Joe Hill’s name on the front cover did exactly what it was placed there to do. Chemotherapy has knocked a few holes in my memory but I promise, this is really the last of the books that I read over the Bank Holiday Weekend...

PLUNGE INTO TERROR! 

In 1983, a state-of-the-art drilling ship, the Derleth, vanished near the Arctic Circle. Decades later, it has begun sending a distress call... Tracing the signal to a remote atoll in the Bering Strait, the Rococo oil company hires the Carpenter brothers and their salvage crew to investigate the ghost ship. Joined by a marine biologist and an oil executive, the brothers set out on a grim mission to learn what caused the disappearance and recover the bodies of the crew...only to find that the Derleth's men aren't dead! Even if they're also not quite alive anymore…

‘Plunge’ is a tricky one to pin down, especially as I don’t want to give too much away. Let’s just say that it’s horror with some seasoning a la Lovecraft, which possibly makes it a little bit sci-fi as well. What I will say though is that ‘Plunge’ opens with a compelling mystery that soon develops into something much larger. It’s another slow-burner but Hill’s cast, and his ability to lend urgency to those big questions, makes the book very easy to stick with. Before I knew it, the scene was set and I was deep into finding out what’s happening on the small atoll of Sinnikik Ungayagagta.

And what happens on that atoll gives the plot a shot in the arm at exactly the right time; even I have only so much time for slow-burners (especially at the moment) so Hill kicking things up a gear, or two, was just what I needed. I really appreciated Hill’s channelling of Carpenter’s ‘The Thing’, with enough of a spin on it to make the twist (when it came) a genuine shock, even though you half see it coming. And then we’re back into Lovecraft territory again, with enough action left over (from riffing off ‘The Thing’) to end things pretty damn spectacularly. This is especially the case given some absolutely gorgeous art from Stuart Immonen that really captures the stark mix of bleak ‘earthly danger’ and the gradual intrusion of something entirely otherworldly.

‘Plunge’ trod a fine line that almost sent the plot into a meandering spiral but the timing of the plot left me wondering whether that was Hill’s plan all along. Either way, I ended up thoroughly enjoying ‘Plunge’, a random purchase that really paid off.

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