Magazine Review: The Dark Side – Issue 155

The Dark Side Magazine
Issue 155
Editor: Alan Bryce
Ghoulish Publishing

The Dark Side’s lengthy series of enormous features on elements of classic UK horror continues with an issue largely devoted to the classic TV horror double bills that were so influential to a lot of fans.

It’s billed as the biggest issue of the magazine ever, which isn’t strictly true as the extra chunk of pages in the middle of the issue are taken up with a preview of a title called CULT TV TIMES, covering classic cult TV titles such as the puppet based shows of Gerry Anderson and other retro fare. It’s intended as a taster to see what interest there would be in a print magazine along those lines. It’s interesting and well produced, but it interrupts what is otherwise another stellar issue.

As ever, the main feature by Denis Meikle has been researched extremely well and is thoroughly engrossing reading, covering those much-missed double bills.

However, this time around it has to be said that James Kloda’s feature on the demented new anthology movie The ABCs of Death is the best piece of the issue. Gathering many of the filmmakers responsible for the short segments that make up that modern masterpiece of madness and mayhem, it’s an interesting look at how a huge number of creative minds came together for the same project.

Also high on the list of must-read sections of this issue is John Hamilton’s excellent first part of a history of Tigon Pictures, one of the classic British horror studios alongside Hammer and Amicus. The chunky reviews section remains satisfying as ever, as are interviews with Nicky Henson (Psychomania), Ian Ogilvy (Witchfinder General etc), David Hayman (Sawney: Flesh of Man) and more delights besides.

The CULT TV TIMES supplement may interrupt the magazine somewhat, but it does add further value to what is already an exemplary publication. Hopefully this excellent current era of the magazine will be enough to finally calm (if not erase) any of the negativity that people may still harbour for the magazine due to how its previous run ended. Overall a somewhat uneven issue, but still head and shoulders above most genre magazines on the market right now.