By STEPHEN ROMANO, PAT CARBAJAL (Eibon; 2020)

A stand-out graphic novel from Eibon Press and the team of scripter Stephen Romano and artist Pat Carbajal.  Other Romano/Carbajal collaborations include MANIAC and LASERBLAST, both adapted from old movies.  BOTTOMFEEDER was based on an early 2010s Romano penned screenplay that was supposed to be made into a movie produced by Eibon’s head Shawn Lewis.  When the financing failed to materialize the script was adapted into a three issue comic book series that in 2020 was released as a graphic novel, which unlike the individual issues was printed in black and white—hence the “Full Black” subtitle contained on Eibon’s website–and features a newly written introduction by Joe Lansdale.

A stand-out graphic novel from Eibon Press and the team of scripter Stephen Romano and artist Pat Carbajal. 

The pitch for this twisted tale was “BAD LIEUTENANT meets HUMANOIDS FROM THE DEEP,” an entirely accurate summation.  The protagonist is the ironically monikered Joe Angel, a guilt-ridden, heroin-addicted police commissioner stationed in the seaside burg of San Lucifer.  Here mass toxic waste has created giant mutant crayfish with a taste for human flesh—critters whose creation, as Angel’s investigation uncovers, was not entirely accidental.

As in other Eibon comics, BOTTOMFEEDER is nobody’s idea of family friendly reading.  In its replication of the gist of 1970s exploitation cinema it’s filled with profanity and politically incorrect verbiage, and doesn’t skimp on the gore—things for which Romano, as he admits in his afterword, has been taken to task by many a social media loudmouth (as Smith claims in his own afterword, “No offense intended to anyone, but fuck those guys”).  This is, in short, pure exploitation movie delirium with all the trimmings, although it contains a core of real upset and despair that recalls Romano’s famously bleak prose anthology THE RIOT ACT.  Romano was dealing with the aftermath of a catastrophic car accident when he wrote much of BOTTOMFEEDER, meaning his meticulous depiction of Angel’s deteriorating mental state required very little in the way of imaginative projection.

Romano was dealing with the aftermath of a catastrophic car accident when he wrote much of BOTTOMFEEDER, meaning his meticulous depiction of Angel’s deteriorating mental state required very little in the way of imaginative projection.

Another Eibon trademark is the fact that the characters pictured are all drawn in the likenesses of actual people. The late actor Joe Pilato (a George Romero regular), who was meant to headline the BOTTOMFEEDER movie, provides the features of Joe Angel, while other characters are “played” by the B-movie legends Zoe Tamerlis, Clu Gulager and Bill Moseley.

Another Eibon trademark is the fact that the characters pictured are all drawn in the likenesses of actual people. 

The effect works brilliantly due to the skilled artwork of Pat Carbajal, whose depictions of the human form are as superbly detailed as the innumerable decapitations, dissections and dismemberments that pack these pages. The fact that it’s in black and white is an unexpected enhancement, lending the proceedings a noir feel that compliments the gritty atmosphere quite well.