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Silent Hill: Paint It Black

At4w silent hill p i t by masterthecreater-d4bgmg9-768x339

Released
October 3rd, 2011
Running time
29:42
Previous review
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Tagline
Silence will fall... but not today, since this is another Silent Hill comic where nobody shuts up.
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Linkara: (massaging his forehead in frustration) Okay, people, this has to stop. I can't spend every October complaining about crappy Silent Hill comics. I think it gets a little boring after a while, since it keeps boiling down to the same problem again and again: Scott Ciencin doesn't know jack about Silent Hill!

(Shots of Linkara's past reviews of Silent Hill comics are shown)

Linkara (v/o): Let's review, shall we? Two years ago, we examined "Silent Hill: Dying Inside". Two issues of that were devoted to introducing the character of Troy Abernathy, who died and became a servant of the town. His overall purpose to the storyline was, in the end, completely meaningless. The other three issues of the miniseries looked at Lauryn, a jackass who got her friends killed so she could have zombie minions to face off against her deceased sister Christabella, who had become a demon or something. And there was this guy named Whatley, who was apparently important and one of the original town founders or something like that, and it ended with Lauryn somehow gaining control over Silent Hill. Its direct sequel we looked at last year: "Silent Hill: Dead/Alive" about how Whatley is apparently trying to spread the evil of Silent Hill to the entire world, by screwing around with an actor and trying to make him into a serial killer. Christabella was supposed to be turning good or something; Lauryn executed a bizarre gambit that made no sense; and the whole thing ended by summoning a goddess or something that shifted everybody into parallel dimensions. That's actually a good alternate title for these stories: "Or Something: The Comics". They're sure as hell not Silent Hill stories, and what's more, they're not very good horror stories. They had terrible pacing, nonsensical plot points, and a backstory confusingly weaved into it that is never explicitly explained or detailed enough for us to get into it. The artwork is atrocious and often, I found myself needing to read expository sections at the beginnings of each individual comic to try to untangle what was going on.

Linkara: However, in between "Dying Inside" and "Dead/Alive", Scott Ciencin wrote three Silent Hill one-shots, and this month, we're going to take a look at all three and see if maybe, just maybe, he can pull something interesting out of all this. So let's start things off with (holds up the first comic) "Silent Hill: Paint It Black".

(The title sequence plays, followed by the title card for this episode, set to "Letter From the Lost Days" from Silent Hill 3; cut to a closeup of the comic's cover)

Linkara (v/o): Let's get the good news out of the way first. These one-shots have none of the main characters of "Dying Inside" and "Dead/Alive". While they do take place within Scott Ciencin's warped little screwy horror universe, there's no Christabella, no Lauryn and no Troy. Whatley is apparently a factor in one or two of these, but hey, maybe we'll actually learn why the hell he's supposed to be important in these proceedings...

(Cut to a shot of Whatley in "Dead/Alive")

Linkara (v/o): ...when the most he ever did was have a kinda-sorta battle with Lauryn in "Dead/Alive".

(Cut back to the current Silent Hill story)

Linkara (v/o): We're reading this one from a trade collection that has the three stories in it, and it's called "Silent Hill: Three Bloody Tales".

Linkara: Not that the tales contain copious amounts of blood; it's just British slang. (mock British accent) "Three Bloody Tales"!

(Cut to a shot of Silent Hill character Ike Isaacs)

Linkara (v/o): We're starting with "Paint It Black" because it's the story that features the character Ike Isaacs, Lauryn's boyfriend that we saw from "Dead/Alive". He was a painter who thought that Silent Hill would be the perfect place to act like a walking action movie cliche. He was completely out of place in that story, stealing lines from Bruce Campbell and just generally getting on my nerves.

(Cut back to the cover of "Three Bloody Tales")

Linkara (v/o): Some people have stated that they want me to look at the covers of a book, even if I'm reading them out of a trade. As I've explained, the reason I generally don't when I'm reviewing from a trade is because the cover of a comic is meant to entice a reader to pick it up from a rack of other comics, which isn't a factor for a trade paperback. If you're not actively seeking out the trade, then you will usually only see a trade when it's on a bookshelf, and only the spine is facing out. Thus, the cover for a trade is usually fairly worthless in terms of enticing readers, like a single issue's cover is.

Linkara: Well, I do try to give the people what they want, so let's take a look at "Paint It Black"'s cover, shall we?

(A shot of the cover is shown)

Linkara (v/o): There! Behold the cover to "Paint It Black": the same grimy art style as most of these comics, and Ike Isaacs is just standing there in front of a guy being crucified upside-down and missing his legs. Maybe he's being eaten alive. I can't tell, because it's so poorly drawn! Oh, and let's not forget the diverse amount of colors on this cover, like BROWN! Yep, it was certainly a good use of my time to look at this cover.

(The comic opens to the first page)

Linkara (v/o): We open to a painting of a naked woman aiming her arm up into the sky and shooting an energy blast out from it. Or maybe it's the Eye of Sauron; I can't tell.

Ike: It's crap.

Linkara: (holds up index finger) Hey, let's not be too hasty here. This painting might actually be the first thing in any of these comics that I'm slightly interested in.

Linkara (v/o): It turns out the person who's calling it crap is Ike himself.

Ike: I mean... it's alright, it's okay...

Linkara: There's a big difference between "it's okay" and "it's crap". BE CONSISTENT!

Ike: I'm just not feeling it, like something's missing and I just–

Voice from off-panel: Asshole!

Linkara: Hey, someone who didn't like "Dead/Alive", either.

Ike: Is there a problem, Joe?

Joe: Jesus, Ike, all you ever think about is yourself. I let you crash because I figured you didn't have anywhere else to go, you just needed some time to get your s**t together. And for months you've just been sitting around eating my food, not even trying to get a job... Now I find out you've done this with everyone. Ike, you're a ***king leech!

Linkara: Wow, so far, this is my favorite of Scott Ciencin's Silent Hill comics: there was a legitimately interesting painting and we've got a likeable character in the form of ("finger quotes") "Joe" here.

Ike: What do you want me to do?

Linkara: GET A JOB!!

Ike: Way harsh, yo!

Linkara: You're a waste of space, yo!

Linkara (v/o): So Joe kicks him out, becoming the first person in any of these comics to do something that makes sense. And naturally, we never see him again. Farewell, Joe, you were loved. After Ike fails to get anyone to get anyone else to take his worthless ass in – though he at least offers to cook and do laundry for the other person, but knowing him so far, he'd probably screw that up royally – he wanders the streets with all his possessions and swearing a whole bunch. He goes into a subway station next to a guy who has candles and tattoos and asks about the guy's tattoo for "Wraithslayer".

Tattooed guy: Best band ever. Never heard of them? Music today is crap, don't know where it's at.

Linkara (v/o): I bring up this dialogue not to make a joke, but rather to point out that the next panel has the guy screaming...

Tattooed guy: Ahh... No, please... All over me, they're EVERYWHERE...

Linkara: Poor guy, he's imagining Justin Bieber fangirls attacking.

Linkara (v/o): So, what's up with that? Did he fall asleep between panels or something? Ike asks if it was a bad dream, and the guy says he was actually there, in Silent Hill.

Tattooed guy: (narrating) Shadows... Shadows are alive in Silent Hill.

Linkara: Ah, foreshadowing the inevitable Silent Hill and Babylon 5 crossover.

Tattooed guy: (narrating) No one lives there anymore.

(And now a quick list of people who were living or presumed living to be living within Silent Hill (to "The Gonk" by Herbert Chappell): Dahlia Gillespie, Dr. Michael Kaufman, Lisa Garland, Claudia Wolf, and Vincent)

Linkara (v/o): And after all, if no one was living there anymore, why, oh, why wouldn't the town be bulldozed by now?

Tattooed guy: (narrating) But there's still power and the supermarkets are stocked with food.

Linkara: (as the tattooed guy) The bad news is that it's all food from Hardee's.

Linkara (v/o): He talks about how he just barely managed to escape the town, but his friend Phil sacrificed himself to let him escape.

Linkara: What is with this comic and showing us minor characters who are more interesting and likeable than Ike?

Tattooed guy: (narrating) Whatever you do, don't go there!

Linkara (v/o): Aaand we cut to Ike traveling to Silent Hill, despite being given no directions or knowledge of how to get there. Oh, and before you think he was drawn there because the town called to him supernaturally or maybe he'd be in search of a lost love or something, Ike proclaims...

Ike: You had me at "food."

Linakra (v/o): Yes, our hero had the ingenious idea of going to Silent Hill because he's a lazy artiste type who refuses to get a job and thus has decided that his best bet is to go to a place that someone ominously gave him a warning about and mentioned how their friend died there by man-eating rats!

(Cut to a shot of Lauryn)

Linkara (v/o): You know, at least when Lauryn went to Silent Hill, she did it because she was motivated by love and guilt over her dead sister.

(Cut back to "Paint It Black")

Linkara (v/o): This comic's hero is truly a complete douchebag.

Linkara: And before anyone suggests that maybe he'll undergo a character arc where he'll change and become better as a result of his experiences, I'd just like to remind you that we've read "Dead/Alive", and we know that won't happen!

Linkara (v/o): Ike enters Silent Hill and forgets to save his game while he's at it... Look, the symbol's right there; now we have to endure the opening again if he dies! ...and proclaims...

Ike: This place is awesome!

Linkara: (listlessly) Ike, why do I get the feeling that if I shot you in the head, the bullet would miss your brain entirely because it's so tiny?

Linkara (v/o): Ike sees the monsters all around him and takes inspiration from them, painting his heart away. According to his dialogue, he stays there for at least two weeks and is virtually ignored by the monsters. In fact, the monsters start actively assisting him, handing him his brush and posing in various manners to give him inspiration. Later, he spots a group of people all wearing yellow raincoats running around the streets and screaming in horror. He tries to tell them not to run since the monsters aren't bad, just different – and the people are all slaughtered by the monsters.

Ike: They're seriously PMS-ing.

Linkara: (listlessly) Fantastic, Ike is a sociopath on top of everything else. No wonder he ended up getting together with Lauryn. (scowls)

Linkara (v/o): Well, okay, I'm being a little harsh. When the monsters want him to paint the dead bodies, he realizes something's up. However, it's not out of empathy for the poor people who were just killed, but rather because he doesn't want to die. The selfishness does piss me off a bit, but he could just be in shock. Oh, and it turns out he's there for six months! (dopey voice) Time transitions? What are those? Durrrr! (normal again) He gets magazine in his mail... Who the hell's delivering the mail? ...that say that he's considered an all-out genius for his artwork and that he's famous for the paintings. Well, there's no accounting for taste, but this is what finally inspires him to leave. He rambles to himself about how he'll be rich and living the high life. Oh, goody, we have character consistency! He's so into his artwork that he can't get a regular friggin' job, but once he has fame, (scoffs) ah, screw the art!

Ike: Live in the best hotels. Order room service all the time. Gourmet pizza with fresh veggies... Go to the Bahamas, man, be chillin' with the honeys down there...

Linkara: (deadpan, raising his fist in the air) Live the dream, Ike.

Linkara (v/o): However, his attempts to leave are thwarted when, as he attempts to leave the town, he finds himself right back in the center of it. Repeated attempts just cause the same thing, and none of the cars in the town will turn on. And thus, we cut to another six months later. No narrative captions telling us that; it's Ike saying that he's been there for a year now. However, as he's talking to himself, a woman suddenly shows up and asks him if he's in charge. In addition, there's like three dozen more people who are also there and are all clones. Some of the redheaded variety, some of the white-haired... I assume supposed to be blonde variety... and all of them really pale and white.

Woman: I'm Cheryl.

(Cut to a clip of the Silent Hill game)

Cheryl: Daddy–where are you?

Cheryl's Father: Cheryl!

Linkara: (waving dismissively) No, no, no, no, not that Cheryl! Remember, these have nothing to do with the games, other than the name of the series and a monster list.

Linkara (v/o): But hey, maybe we'll have a likeable hero, finally.

Cheryl: I'm Cheryl, Bengals team captain. Our bus ran over something outside of town and broke an axle. Weird-looking thing, but it's sandwich meat now, whatever it was.

Linkara: (bored) Or she could be vapid, uninteresting and un-empathetic. I miss Joe.

Linkara (v/o): Ike, knowing what will happen when there are people around, panics and runs back into his building. He locks the door and tells himself he hasn't seen anything and takes a nap. You know, I wouldn't mind this as much if he was only starting to be like this now, after a year alone with no one to talk to but monsters who want him to paint horrific imagery, but he's been a dick like this the entire time, so I don't even care! Oh, and just to really ramp up the stupid, the girls, who are all cheerleaders, start practicing!

Cheryl: We have a state championship in front of us, and just because we hit a little bump in the road does not mean we stop practicing.

Linkara: YES, IT DOES! You're stranded without any means of contact in what appears to be an abandoned city! You don't seem to have any supervision, making me wonder whatever happened to the bus driver, and the only person you encountered is someone who screams and runs when he sees you! THIS MEANS STOP PRACTICING!

Linkara (v/o): Also, I'm starting to think Scott Ciencin doesn't know anything about cheerleading either.

Cheryl: Asses and elbows, ladies! Move it! Work it! NOWWWWWWW! (Linkara pronounces it: "NOW-WUH-WUH-WUH-WUH-WUH-WUH!")

Linkara (v/o): Yeah, emphasize the W, that's the letter that's stretched when people hold a word. And yeah, no specific moves, just "asses and elbows", because those are the only things used in cheerleading, right? Well, I admit, I don't know anything about cheerleading either, so maybe this is the sort of thing that happens with cheerleaders. Then again, even if I did know cheerleading moves, they'd probably wouldn't include them in a horror story about an EVIL FRIGGIN' TOWN!! Okay, believe it or not, we're not even halfway into this... and this is where it starts getting stupid. Oh, yeah! Ike, the selfish dickhead? That isn't the dumbest thing about this comic. The cheerleaders finally stop screaming things, and Ike looks out, shocked that they haven't been taken yet. Cheryl somehow manages to pick the lock on Ike's place.

Cheryl: Hope you didn't mind.

Linkara: (sarcastically) Oh, yeah, I'm sure he doesn't mind you breaking and entering his place at all. Go die in a fire.

Linkara (v/o): She asks what's up with the town since there's electricity and everything, but every attempt to call outside the town or get a car working fails.

Ike: State trooper comes by every couple of days. Probably be here tomorrow.

Linkara: (appalled by what he read) WHAT?!?!?

Linkara (v/o): ARE YOU FREAKIN' KIDDING ME?!? IS IKE SERIOUS?! A state trooper comes into the town every few days?! WHY THE HELL AREN'T THEY EVER ATTACKED?! If it's a regular visit, does he ever interact with Ike? If he does, why doesn't he ever kick him out for living in a building that is clearly not his? If he doesn't interact, why was Ike so shocked to see the cheerleaders in the town as if he hasn't seen regular people for a while?! And if the monsters aren't attacking the state trooper, why would you then be so shocked to see the cheerleaders still alive?! And oh, no, this is not the dumb I was talking about! Yes, it gets worse! Cheryl says the cheerleaders will stay the night.

Cheerleader 1: Bored now.

Cheerleader 2: Place is gloomy.

Cheerleader 1: What a dump.

Cheerleader 2: Are you thinking what I'm thinking?

Cheerleader 1: You know it.

Cheerleaders 1 and 2: (in unison) CHRISSY & MISSY PROJECT!

(Linkara stares, open-mouthed, and rolls his eyes upward; cut to a clip of an episode of Scrubs)

Dr. Cox: (making a blinking motion with his hand) This is my new imaginary warning light. Whenever it starts blinking, a situation has ten seconds to resolve itself before I flash white with rage and kill someone. One... two...

(Cut back to the comic)

Cheerleader 1: We've got to get some color in here.

Cheerleader 2: I think a nice potpourri to get rid of the smell...

(Cut back to the episode of Scrubs)

Dr. Cox: (still making a blinking motion with his hand) Seven... eight... nine...

(Back to the comic again)

Linkara (v/o): Oh, yes, somehow, in a span of two seconds, these cheerleaders have put up balloons, curtains, and generally redecorated Ike's living space with pink everywhere! Where the hell did they get all this crap?! Why the hell do they not care about their bus crashing?! And these aren't demons, either! I checked ahead! These are actual people, according to the comic! THERE'S ARE NOT IKE'S HALLUCINATIONS! WHAT YOU ARE SEEING IS HAPPENING!!

Cheryl: Trust us. We've done this before, and it's for the best.

Linkara: You've gone into other people's homes without permission and redecorated?! You're a bunch of assholes!!

Ike: You washed my clothes? These aren't my boxers. They move!

Linkara: Oh, nice, not content with ripping of Evil Dead; now you're ripping off Red Dwarf!

(Cut to a clip of an episode of Red Dwarf)

Dave Lister: (holding up a pair of boxers) No way these my boxer shorts. These bend?

Linkara (v/o): Oh, dear Lord, how I wish I was watching Red Dwarf right now. You know, Lister may have been a lazy bum, but at least he had a good heart. At least he cared about other people and other living beings. At least his character changed and developed. And at least Red Dwarf was a comedy!

(Cut back to the comic)

Linkara (v/o): This?! This is... I don't even know what the hell this is!

Ike: What'd I do to deserve this?

Linkara (v/o): And then it flashes back to Joe telling him off.

Linkara: (leaning forward) SUBTLE.

Cheryl: See, Ike? What goes around comes around.

(Editor's note: "Pink dream what the hell?!")

Cheryl: You invaded other people's space and now we're invading yours.

Linkara: EVEN MORE SUBTLE! (beat) AND INACCURATE!

Linkara (v/o): With Joe, he had invited Ike into his home, and Ike had taken advantage over a long period of time. You're a bunch of cheerleaders who went into his space without his permission and are screwing things up in record time! This isn't the same thing at all!

Cheryl: And since I'm just your deranged fantasy version of the real Cheryl, I can say that and get away with it.

Linkara: (dumbfounded) What? What does that even mean?! That has nothing to do with anything(stops as he briefly stammers) Screw it, we need to move on! There's more dumb to come!

Linkara (v/o): When Ike finally yells at them to leave, they knock him out and drag him into a closet or something and lock him in. Oh, fantastic. Way to make me not care even more. A few hours later, Cheryl brings him some soup.

Cheryl: Thought you might be hungry. Don't try anything. I know seven schools of hand-to-hand combat and I have a baseball bat.

Linkara: (getting quite peeved) "Seven schools of hand-to-hand combat"... (he holds up his fist, his face twisted in anger, but then he stammers and goes back to reading) Fine, fine!

Linkara (v/o): Ike tries to warn them that the things in the paintings are real and they'll kill them all... I don't know why he cares all of a sudden... but Cheryl doesn't believe him, and more time passes, with Ike wondering what's taking the monsters so long. Me, too. Finally, Cheryl lets him out, and now she's wearing this bizarre getup and has an assault rifle.

Linkara: Wait, what?

Cheryl: I went shopping.

(Linkara repeatedly slaps himself in the face with the comic)

Ike: What's up with the artillery?

Cheryl: Dad was a survivalist. Crazy bastard. But he taught me everything he knew.

(Cut to the MST3K gang watching Space Mutiny)

Tom Servo: It took him twenty seconds.

Linkara: WHERE DID YOU GET THE GUNS?! DO THEY COME STANDARD WITH POM POMS NOW?!

Linkara (v/o): And yeah, I said "guns", as in "plural"! The other girls are all decked out in black military gear now, too, and have their own guns! Yeah, I can see why they did that in the space of a few hours, when all that's happened is that the two redheads, Chrissy and Missy, got taken by a monster.

Cheryl: They were having a pillow fight. Negligees, harmless fun. Have to blow off some steam somehow with all the pressure we're under.

Linkara: I take it back – these are not real people! REAL PEOPLE DO NOT DO THESE THINGS!!

Linkara (v/o): Cheryl says she can just feel they're still alive, so they have to mount a rescue mission. Yes, trust the empathic powers of Cheryl – survivalist, commando, cheerleader! She asks him if there are any places where the monsters nest, and he figures the closest is the bowling alley since they've tried to keep him away from there.

Cheryl: The bowling alley. That's where we'll find them. Suit up, ladies. It's time to kick some monster butt!

(Cut to a clip of another episode of Scrubs, showing a film crew doing a hula dance against their will)

Crewman 1: (crying while dancing) When will it end?!

Crewman 2: (also crying while dancing) What madness describes her?!

(Back to the comic again)

Linkara (v/o): Ike comes along with them, apparently by his own choice.

Cheryl: You didn't have to do this. It's my job to protect my girls, but you... Well, thank you.

Linkara: One, he's not even carrying a gun. He's a liability, not help! Two, you've done such a great job protecting them so far, dumbass. Three, it is far, far too late to make me like Ike!

Cheryl: (taking out a pink card) This is for my folks, in case I don't make it. Try and see that they get it, 'kay?

Linkara: And it is equally too late to make me like her. I don't care if she dies!

Ike: Too real.

Linkara: Too stupid! What does that even mean?!

Linkara (v/o): They reach a parking garage and are attacked by monsters. Yeah, I bet you'd never thought you'd see a bunch of cheerleaders wearing warpaint and military gear – with black miniskirts, no less; classy ass shot there, by the way – wielding machine guns and shooting at monsters... IN SILENT FRIGGIN' HILL!

Ike: I did not sign up for this!

(Cut to another clip of Scrubs)

Dr. Cox: Too much talking, too much talking, too much talking, too much talking, too much talking, too much... talking.

(Cut back to the comic)

Linkara (v/o): Anyway, they find a fire truck, which inexplicably works despite everything else not working. At first, it looked like they just found some fire extinguishers, and I thought they were actually going to be clever and get around the whole "cars not working" thing with those, but no, the fire truck just works. And naturally, going on a commando raid to rescue their friends, they make as much noise as possible as they proceed. They apparently reach the bowling alley and are faked out by a bunch of Pyramid Heads. At this point, I just don't care about anything. And considering how long this review has been going for, I'm just going to give one big summary in the last ten or so pages of this crap. They escape the Pyramid Heads by Ike painting a hole in the wall. How he knows he can do this is anyone's guess, but I suppose we discover what happened to that hole that was there that is gone now. He and Cheryl enter some nether dimension full of paintings, and Cheryl asks how he knows he can do this, and he just says he "felt like it already existed and just figured out how to get there"; AKA the writer is FRIGGIN' LAZY!! Apparently, Ike's paintings have been causing real people to die, or something like that. Again, these Silent Hill comics are horrible at sequential storytelling, having to spell stuff out for us, and even then, it doesn't make any sense. Ike tells her to torch the paintings... and that somehow kills the monsters, and they escape into some kind of demonic medical school where demon doctors are dissecting things or something, and they find the redheads. We actually get the first original monster to ever appear in these comics: some kind of demonic cyberpunk doctor that, I hate to admit, I actually kind of like.

Linkara: No, seriously, this guy looks like something from Silent Hill. He talks, but he isn't annoying like Christabella, and he's got a unique visual look to him that doesn't make him seem like a Pyramid Head ripoff, like the Butcher was.

Linkara (v/o): And of course, he's completely wasted here. Before he starts dissecting Christy [sic] and Missy, Ike goes in to try to stop them.

Ike: It's a sweet deal y'all set up for me here, yo, it really is. But... do you really gotta eat every sorry mofo* that comes through here?

  • NOTE: It's actually "motherfucker", but Linkara censors it as "mofo" instead.

Linkara: What a convincing argument, Ike. I'm sure you've won them over with that well-worded soliloquy. (points to camera) Eat your heart out, St. Crispin's Day Speech.

Linkara (v/o): Yeah, the monsters say they had high hopes for him and just attack, and the group tries to retreat. Cheryl hands Ike a gun and tells them [sic] to keep them off their back and she'll come back with reinforcements. She and the redheads make it out, and when she learns that two of their fellows didn't make it, she orders them to leave Ike behind and go, despite Ike yelling for them to come back and get him.

Cheryl: I'm the captain of this cheerleading team. Leaders have to make tough choices...

Linkara: I'd go into a rant about how leading a cheerleading squad has nothing to do with being in the military, and you're just a jerk since you have guns and could go back ten feet and get him, but... (shrugs) I don't care.

Cheryl: ...Like my daddy said before they stormed the cave, you do what you have to do to survive.

Linkara: (incredulously) What cave?! What're you talking about?!

Linkara (v/o): So the cheerleaders leave, somehow managing to escape the town in their fire truck. It's hinted that the two redheads are demons now, but I don't know why we're supposed to give a damn.

Linkara: (holding up comic angrily) THIS COMIC SSSSSSUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCKKKKKKSSSS!!!!

Linkara (v/o): I mean, wow, this thing is awful! What's really sad about this is could have easily been turned into a good Silent Hill comic. The games have used paintings before to great effect; in particular, the original painting of Pyramid Head. Artwork, paintings, drawings, art galleries, they have such potential for horror, from disturbing imagery to just screwing with your head. But the painting aspect barely has anything to do with this story. We know the monsters wanted him to paint the stuff; it was to set up "Dead/Alive". Once again, even if we ignore that it has nothing to do with Silent Hill, it's not scary. The characters all are dreadful, unlikeable, truly ugly people. No one acts like a human being, except for Joe, who was in all of two pages. There's no moral redemption for anyone. The cheerleaders don't even care that members of their squad have died, they pull stuff out of their asses, and nothing is accomplished! The only saving grace is a single, original monster that I want to know more about, and naturally is never seen or brought up in any of the other Silent Hill comics. This is, in fact, worse than "Dead/Alive". At least "Dead/Alive" tried to be horror, tried to have believable characters, and Ike was just a leftover from this nonsense. It failed, yes, but it tried to be something. This? This was 48 pages of NOTHING!

Linkara: And there are still (holds up two fingers) two more of these things to go, people. Can Scott Ciencin do even worse? Or could he actually pull something interesting out of his ass? Well, tune in next week to find out.

(Suddenly, as is often the case with Linkara's Silent Hill videos, the sound of a siren is heard and fog fills up the room. Linkara looks around, more in frustration than fear, and nonchalantly takes out his communicator)

Linkara: (into communicator) It's begun.

(End credits roll)

So why the hell did it take the town ONE YEAR before it finally got around to its "ironic" punishment for Ike? Furthermore, REALLY? It's punishing him because he was lazy? Oh, yeah, it's certainly worth the town's time to deal with lazy people, what with all those murderers it usually deals with.

Also, why are the cheerleaders doing Ike's laundry? Didn't they have to practice? They seriously decided to stop their practicing to clean up somebody else's home? WHY?!

I actually wanted to use another Silent Hill tune for the ending, but when else am I going to use this song?

(Stinger: Spoony is seen in his room)

Spoony: All right, well, people have been waiting very patiently, and I think finally, it's time for me to unveil... (holds up...) "Warrior #4"! Finally, we can–

(Suddenly, he is interrupted by the strange buzzing sound that's been happening for a while now; he looks around)

Spoony: What– What the hell is that noise?

(Suddenly, he holds up his hand in shock as static fills up the room; he screams as the static obscures the screen briefly before clearing away, revealing that Spoony has disappeared, having dropped his comic in the process)

(end)

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