STANLEY AND THE HAUNTED HOUSE. Storm Kids Next Nostalgic Adventure
As part of the Storm Kids range, Stanley And The Haunted House is the latest adventure of Stanley Squirrel and his many friends.
For their Halloween adventure Stanley goes to prove that ghosts don’t exist by staying the night in Bunnyburrow Manor. Though there are mixed feelings with the rest of their group, Natasha Squirrel is especially determined to prove Stanley wrong and get a photo of the ghosts.
The first impression anyone old enough should get is an extreme love of the classic Looney Tunes cartoons. The style of drawing, character dynamics and jokes are all heavily reminiscent of the iconic cartoon series. And although it is just as light and saccharine as its nostalgic heritage, this is still a decently paced and entertaining read. If you have any history with Looney Tunes, it will help this be at least tolerable (if not actually endearing), even though you aren’t the actual target audience.
Jeff Balke has done a good job of keeping the pacing high and the set pieces interesting as the story progresses, despite its predictability (which is only really a problem for us older readers). Everything flows well, and though the jokes can be a little corny or flat at times, they aren’t pace killers.
The only serious issue, which I could especially see for any reader (young or old), is a big lack of context. Without having read the previous issue from Halloween 2020, Stanely’s Ghost, it is a struggle to find out what the characters names are, let alone their various archetypal personalities. There is a lot of implied history and chemistry between the characters which could have been helped with a simple introductory page at the start that gave a brief description of each character. Without it the reader could tend to feel like a bit of an outsider to the adventures therein.
However this does create a secondary puzzle, and a reason to re-read the story a least a couple of times. As it takes a few passes to clarify their various names and personality traits. Some might find it strangely intriguing, as there are enough hints to piece it all together, but it does detract from the actual story being told.
At the end of the day, it is still a light and fluffy tale for young readers, with some nostalgic trends for older ones.
Stay up to date with “The Dark Side Of Pop Culture” by following MacabreDaily on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
