Review by C.J. Bunce

The Strange Tales of Oscar Zahn is the latest Web Toon comic adapted into a hardcover storybook edition.  In this first volume of what looks like an ongoing series, we meet the title character, a strange appearing ghost–we just see his skull floating above his body–who is a paranormal investigator and professor of cryptozoology.  He’s a little bit Dresden from The Dresden Files and DC Comics’ Constantine, and with an even darker spin on Casper the Friendly Ghost.  The story and artwork are all from the mind and pen of Tri Vuong, who you may know from his run on the LEGO Ninjago: Garmadon comic book.  The Strange Tales of Oscar Zahn is now available at your local comic shop and here at Amazon.

The look and vibe is one hundred percent Mike Mignola.  At times I thought I was reading an issue of Mignola’s BPRD or Hellboy or Mignola and Matt Kindt’s RIPD and Dept.H.  Are you a fan of vintage deep sea diving outfits?  Are you a fan of twisted H.P. Lovecraft doomed adventures?  This has all that, and at times a trigger warning may be warranted for some of its more dramatic themes of premature death and loss.

One character, an old seafarer, has a quality similar to the kid who sees dead people in The Sixth Sense–he’s the only character in the story who can see Oscar for the ghostly apparition that he is.  Oscar has a “glamour” ability like Doctor Who’s psychic paper, and this makes everyone else see Oscar how we wants them to see him: typically that’s as a living person.

Infrequently we find Oscar with a lovely little old assistant named Agnes, along with a one-eyed cat, who hopefully gets more coverage in future volumes.  There’s something for every lover of the dark and creepy here, like Cthulhu-esque underwater creatures and spirit representatives of lost objects (think Warehouse 13) that take on an anthropomorphic form.  At other times this feels like the backstory for John Carpenter and Debra Hill’s script for The Fog. 

This is all about ghost hunting, calming restless ghosts, and helping spirits move along, like Constantine and Dresden and Luke Roman of SurrealEstate.  You can’t help think Vuong wanted to create his own adult take on Casper the Ghost, however, and he does it in a way that might conjure the ending of 2001: A Space Odyssey.  Yes, there is a lot going on here.  Along with the Mignola look, Vuong’s characters sometimes sport a manga look.  The story itself has adventure elements that may also conjure for readers similar supernatural fantasy manga tales.