By Hunter T. Patrick

What a feel-good time for everyone but the characters. Ice Cream Man is an anthology series. Each issue is its own one-shot, all being connected by the titular Ice Cream Man. This volume features four different issues and four different stories. Music, drugs, and various other main themes become present. Nothing is scarier than humanity. This is horror, pure delicious horror. The scares are all brief in the pages, but like all good horror, the more thought in this psychological terror, the more fear, and despair that will come to the reader. The horror sticks with you for the four different plots, each different than the last. If you want anything from trouble with couples to trouble with the self and isolation, go on and give it a try. Everything is sprinkled, delicious, terrifying sprinkles. 

The first thing to say about the writing is this; it is meant to see, light when it intersects with the Ice Cream Man. This is a character who is bright and fun, but still such a strong creepiness to him. The brightness gives such a creepy feel for when the story switches to traditional fear and despair. Stories typically begin bright, but the further on, the further unease comes. The pacing is great, with only one story being an issue long does it feel like several one-shots. There is no filler; everything helps itself more and more. There are some hints of things to come, but those are brief and help the story grow even more. 

The artwork looks great. Everything keeps to both a simplified and a more advanced artwork. The simplified artwork looks amazing complimenting the writing and plotting. It does not overpower one, and the other does not overpower the other. It is hard finding a comic where that is the case. This just makes these comics all the stronger. This is a horror comic, and it is needed to say that the series does get a bit supernatural at times. The artwork goes from creepy to horrifying when those moments come. The artwork manages those moments and moments of great pain for characters. The art is a compliment for multiple things and may not be the most breathtaking, but it was never meant to be. This is art that is what is needed for this series. Could not be better.

Is this book good? Nope. It is great. Horror fans should look for this title, but even more than horror fans should, comic fans should as well. This is not a format that is well known and with how well it is, it is quite innovative. The stories stick and are very strong. This volume gives the series so much potential, and the few hints for the future are even stronger reasons to read this for a series that hopefully will continue the quality introduced in here. All horror titles need a few good sprinkles with it. Kind of hard to imagine terror without some sugar.

Score: 5/5

Ice Cream Man Volume 1: Rainbow Sprinkles
Image Comics