Customer Reviews

Return to Barrow (30 Days of Night, Book 3)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Steve Niles' 30 Days of Nights and its follow-up Dark Days were two vampire stories that really hooked me in and wouldn't let go. Niles' finally created a vampire tale that eschewed the Anita Blake and Anne Rice oversexually-obsessed, brooding, and nonscary vampires that became so popular for some reason. Sure Niles' vampires were still well, and sharply dressed but that's were the similarities end. His vampires in both stories were vicious, bloodthirsty, sadistic and most of evil. There wasn't anything to like about these vampires and Niles' made sure that our sympathies were with the living.

In 30 Days of Night: Return to Barrow, Steve Niles brings back the series to the site of the first story and that's the Alaskan town of Barrow. A place still recovering from the events that transpired with the first story-arc. Those survivors who stayed and those who were away during the slaughter return to pick up the pieces of the town's shattered lives. But a group of vampires looking to avenge the deaths of the first group and continue their idea of using Barrow as ahunting ground have other ideas. T

There's really not much new that Niles' adds to what he's already told in the first story. The human inhabitants of Barrow must once again try to survive a vampiric onslaught by themselves with no governmental help. But this time around they know whats coming and have devised countermeasures that they hope would be enough to help them last the month-long night. This wouldn't be a horror comic if everything went as planned. They don't and things get bloody and horrific. The story continues on bloody page to bloody page until the conclusion where a twist on the forest guardian plot technique comes out of the shadows. This ending and those who make their surprising apperance gives Return to Barrow abit more of an optimistic resolution than the previous two books. Usually I would've complained that it was just so Deus Ex Machina, but it made sense and showed that not all vampires must succumbed to their killing nature.

30 Days of Night: Return to Barrow continues the fine story Niles' first started many years ago with 30 Days of Night and Dark Days. Though there wasn't much new things added in terms of ideas, the twist in the end made everything come together to give Return to Barrow its own identity from the other two. Fans of the first two books will not be disappointed.

Some series are identified from the first as "a trilogy in the making". Others start as nominal 1-offs, then spawn a sequel, and then become series only through aggregation.

The second model is arguably harder to pull off, because either (1) the author hasn't planned ahead to inject future plot threads into early stories, or (2) the author does undertake such planning, but has to disguise those incomplete arcs so that early volumes can stand on their own.

I don't know whether Niles envisioned Barrow as a trilogy from the first issue of 30 Days, but my temptation is to doubt it. Rather, I think he was as surprised by the success of 30 Days as everyone else, and had to invent the second and third volumes within the boundaries of the story already established.

That's what makes 30 Days and its sequels so enjoyable. When the first volume came out, it functioned perfectly well as a self-contained story. Then when Dark Days followed after, the series became a neatly balanced two-fer, with the plot and dialog complexities of the latter balancing nicely against the voiceless horror of the original.

And now Return to Barrow re-defines both previous volumes, by making each seem to flow with perfect precision into this final showdown. Threads we had thought fully closed were in fact only temporarily tied; the elaborate final knot had not yet been revealed. Characters we assumed complete still had one last transformation in store.

Like the undead so beautifully rendered, Niles reminds us that no story ever fully dies while it still has its head.

I'm not going to go into a long-winded review. I just want to say that I really enjoyed this graphic novel. Great story and great graphics. I also enjoyed Dark Days and 30 Days of Night. I am a 36 year old female, so that will give you an idea of the difference types of people that can enjoy this series.

I happened to like this addition to the series the most. It had an excitement level that towered over the two previous books. I would argue that the return to Barrow was unique this time around. It may feel similar to the first book, but now we have a new cast of characters and a Barrow that can actually fight back. The best thing that could've happened to the series was the wisening up of Barrow's citizens that the reinforcing of the fort. It was much more thrilling this time around to see the citizens pose a decent fight. I only wanted more length, but due to the style of the series, these books are crammed into small stories. I believe that this would be a better sequel than Dark Days if they attempted to go that route. Only time will tell if the Direct-to-DVD sequel will measure up to the value of the series.

To sum up my enjoyment of the series thus far, they keep getting better. However, that's not saying too much since I didn't enjoy the first volume much at all. The series does, fortunately, keep building on itself to compensate. The artwork becomes less confusing and I'm starting to love to soak it all in. The storywriting is beginning to be more admirable, due to its clever twist-turning. All in all, Return to Barrow is the best yet, giving me hope for the rest of the series.

Once again, we're back into the infinite vastness of barren wastelands surrounding Barrow. We travel through the place whose polar night is full of terror and fear, full of creatures with sharp fangs and craze for human blood. We have been here once before and barely survived our visit. Upon return we find broken people, full of fear and darkness building behind their eyes. They are nervous, frightened, itchy, armed and dangerous. They have been caught once, but this time they are prepared, they are expecting creatures of the night, and they have another sheriff who has much to learn yet.

Third installment in the series and much of it remains the same. Ben Templesmith still does majestic job in graphic representation of desolation, both mental and topographical, Steve Niles still writes simplistic story full of action bits and bullets and blood flying everywhere. There is vampire politics around, sadistic maniacs who even for vampires present a challenge; there is obsession, betrayal and desperate fight for one's own life. And, most important of all - these vampires don't shine on the sunlight. Brute force of nature these vampires are, basically unstoppable whose mere goal is survival in the world full of humans. They are different life forms, without boundaries of human culture, with rules of their own, playing a little masquerade (Whitewolf anyone?) in the civilization that fears and loathes them. And all of this remains hidden behind action-packed pages of this comic. Niles doesn't write about it, it is job of the reader to fill the blanks. And only by filling blanks like these one can find the reason for actually reading (or purchasing) this comic. Return to Barrow is much the same as the first installment in the series, though this one has more emotion than the first one. Hidden, unspoken emotion, more like a feeling of dread (or doom if you like it better) than anything else. But even these rudimentary bits of interaction between characters seem like a whole world of difference when compared to the first book. It is still bad storytelling, it is still cliché survival horror fiction, it is still afraid to step outside the boundaries of the genre, and still we cannot say that it is a good comic book (or graphic novel as they like to call these things these days). Though it's not horrid, it has certain allure (much thanks to Templesmith here) and you catch yourself wondering how long can this keep on. Well, up `till today there are 11 volumes of "30 days of night" storyline and we can guess that this has strong fan following. If I happen to stumble upon fourth one I'll have a look though I don't feel too thrilled about it. So, all that being said I can't really recommend this to you - it's your own call. Personally I think there are much better comics out there on whom you should spend your time and money, but if you're looking for some undemanding vampire action, maybe this is just the right book to start with.

After the film adaptation of 30 Days of Night received only so-so reviews, instead of waiting for the movie on DVD, I decided to take a look at the original comics/graphic novels created by Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith.

Interestingly, 30 days was originally fielded unsuccessfully to studios as a screenplay before Niles hooked up with Templesmith to create the comic. Once the comic came out, even studios that had originally rejected the movie pitch were knocking down the 30 Days creators' doors to get the film rights (according to a 10/18/2007 IGN.com article).

Anyway, when I looked up 30 Days at Amazon, I found that more than just one version existed. There is the original 30 Days of Night; there is #2 called Dark Days; and there is #3 called Return to Barrow. There are even more in the series too, but the above three complete the trilogy created by the original partnership of Niles & Templesmith.

The first is the story of vampires that invade a small town (called Barrow in Alaska) at dusk on the first evening of 30 days before the sun will rise again. The second story is one of revenge; a survivor of the first story hunts and seeks to expose the existence of vampires; and the third story has the brother of a victim from the first story returning to Barrow to discover and expose the awful truth of what originally happened in the town.

The first 30 Days story is what the movie was based on. It's a fast read that took about an hour to get through. As an effect, the way the vampire's lines are written in the text bubbles is crooked, thin-fonted and sloppy; I suppose this was to trying to illustrate the sound of the vampire's voice, but it mostly made for some hard to read, headache inducing text bubbles.

Dark Days and Return were good, but not great like the original. But it was an overall fun series. I'll probably pick up the November 2007 release of 30 Days Of Night: Eben And Stella that picks up and fills an interesting gap between Dark Days and Return to Barrow. Niles is back for Eben and Stella, but Templesmith is out.

As for the movie 30 Days of Night, I'll check that out too after it comes out on DVD and let you if it really 'bites' like others have said it does.

Barrow, Alaska was a scene that saw 19 people out of a population of 462 walk away physically intact and the rest - well, you know the drill. In the three years after-the-fact Barrow has also become a Mecca of sorts, with Vampires striving to erase both proof and place in the proces, the curious looking for answers, and droves of family members hoping to know what really happened on those fateful nights. There are also the people who still reisde in Barrow, knowing what they know and also knowing no one will listen. Enter a new sheriff hoping to understand what happened to his brother, a new wave of events that gather at the mesh walls now surrounding an obscure town in an obscure place, and another 30 days before the sun comes up again.
Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore.

While I didn't think that Return to Barrow lived up to the previous outing in the series, it really had some portions that were emotionally transfixing and I have to say that I liked what Niles did overall. When I read the recount of the sheriff's brother and what had transpired, finding out about him and his family, I was touched by the pain inside the moment and the way it was described. When I saw the expressions that Templesmith etched into one of the hardened Alaska survivors, you could almost see a tinge of wilderness inside that haunted man. There were also some loose ends furthered in the piece, some vampires looking awfully cute (those kids are adorably wild), and then there were the tactile changes that made Barrow something of a Road Warrior type nightmare.
That was the beautiful.
There were some not-so-beautiful areas in the book, too, and some of those might be particularly bothersome depending on what you want/ need. The "secret" harbored in the book was one I still don't know if I really like, and the assault on Barrow has a lot of pieces that are more like footnotes from the first 30 Days. There were differences, granted, and new players in a new game that has different stakes. Still, Dark Days set the sequel bar pretty high and some might find this a bit of a letdown.

If you liked the first 30 Days of Night and have followed along through Dark Days, you might want to finish the story because there are a few loose shoelaces that beg to be tied. If you didn't really like the first but enjoyed the second, you might want to use caution before proceeding. I personally liked the book a lot but this might not be the thing for everyone.
It all boils down to how much the account of Barrow haunts you.

The brother of one of the men that died at Barrow moves there to take up the sheriff position, and find out what really goes on.

The vampires are real, and one of them that comes this time is an FBI agent with a much better grasp of the tactics of conflict.

Luckily for the remaining people, they have some mystery assistance.

This item is marketed as a "book" on this site, and although technically it is a "book", it's actually what is called an "illustrated book", or a "graphic novel" - or in other words, it's actually just a longer comic book that has been bound as a regular paperback book. It's a story that is told mainly with "illustrations", where the only reading is the balloons over the characters. I would call it neither a "book" or a "novel". If you're looking for something to actually "read", this ain't what you're looking for!

I've read both the original 30 Days of Night and the first sequel Dark Days, which were both very enjoyable and entertaining. However, this sequel felt completely unnecessary. The original story was done and done, and this one added nothing at all. It's basically a repeat of the first book, with no new ideas whatsoever.

I tend to think that Steve Niles' writing is serviceable at best, but this time it just didn't have anything memorable at all. Dark Days, the first sequel, actually had very memorable characters, but Return to Barrow was very blah. So yeah, going in, I didn't think the story would be great, but I really did love the art from the first two novels - this time though, it really felt like Ben Templesmith just phoned it in. Or maybe I've just grown used to Templesmith's unique style and so it isn't so original anymore. Really, it felt like both creators phoned in this unnecessary sequel. Overall, I would say skip this one.