Review & Commentary On The New Marvel Phile Issue #82 Curtis Horror By Steve Jolly, with Andrew Goldstein, & the Whole Merry Marvel Super Heroes RPG: The Unofficial Canon Project Crew

 "Happy Halloween everyone! I hope everyone survived... I apparently didn't do so well, as I forgot to post this yesterday! "

"We are excited to present this year's Halloween issue (a day late), featuring characters from Curtiss Magazines - a Marvel imprint, featuring some classic horror characters we know, and some new ones we've never seen before in the RPG! Thanks to Andrew Goldstein for putting this one together!

You can find this one (and all our back issues) at our Google drive!"

https://drive.google.com/.../0B5CaFYN4clT6Z2tOdnVmWjRfbWc...

The New Marvel Phile Issue #82 Curtis Horror By Steve Jolly & Andrew Goldstein has been put together with Write-ups by Andrew Goldstein with contributions by Chris Tyner and Steve Jolly Layout by Steve Jolly and lives up the New Marvel Phile by Marvel Super Heroes RPG: The Unofficial Canon Project usual player's standards. All illustrations by the Marvel bullpen.The New Marvel Phile Issue #82 Curtis Horror hits all of the usual standards set by the New Marvel Phile's standards for layout, fonts, artwork, and the solid use of the FASRIP gaming materials.

The Curtis Horror Imprint is an overlooked by Marvel magazine imprint from the Seventies. We get the low down and history of the imprint from Steve Jolly; "Back in the late 1960s and early 70s, the comics market saw the rise of new publishers who found a loophole through the restrictions of the Comics Code Authority. The loopholeinvolved branding their content not as comic books, but as magazines, packaged as larger formatted black-and-white stories, padded by text content like prose stories, interviews, and industry news. Without the restrictions of the Comics Code, the publishers were able to publish more mature stories with stronger content such as sex, profanity, nudity, and gore. As publishers like Warren and Skywald rose in sales, Marvel wanted a piece of that pie. Using the same stable as its popular comic-book creators,Marvel made use of its parent company, Magazine Management Co. Inc., to form a new imprint -- Curtis Magazines. Established in 1971, the Curtis imprint did not feature the Marvel title or logo, although it did feature a handful of Marvel characters as well as new creations." The first character we get is Desadia whose an on again off again clair voyent and the Gabriel The Devil Hunter the exorcist's asstantant." Gabriel the Devil-Hunter became possessed by the demon Catherine after the death of his wife. After forcing

Catherine out, Gabriel met Desadia for the first time outside of the cathedral where he battled Catherine. Desadia approached him and spoke using the voice and words of Andrea Gabriel, Gabriel's deceased wife." And so Desadia plays a second fiddle to Gabriel often giving occult advice but ultimately her fate after being swept away by demons is unknown. We get a Werewolf By Night foe in the form of Dragonus a demonic servant and tied into the Darkhold. Dragonus serves whatever dark sorercer or black wizard wields the right dark spells of the Darkhold. And he's no push over giving even experienced occult foes pause.

Gabriel The Devil Hunter is a flawed exorcist and former priest whose mixed it up with everyone from the Werewolf By Night to demons from the dark pages of the Darkhold. His lower tier occult knowledge is formitable and he makes an excellent horror NPC for the player's PC heroes. Gabriel is especially good when dealing with minor demons and such. He was rendered invilid after he was caught in the dealings of Damion Hellstrom aka The Son of Satan. However this the Marvel universe so he might have gotten better.

Two occult foes in the form of Hexman a powerful occult ally or NPC whose a voodoo practicier who tortured Quincy Harker after he insulted the gods for months. One of the chiefs of the native tribes Hexman is a powerful NPC to get on the wrong side of. The second foe is a possible mutant called The Hungry One who feeds on sound and was found by hippies Shelia and Denny in a haunted house in New Jersey. The thing's ultimate fate is not known. The thing might still be in the house waiting, after it was called up from it's former home a prehistoric water fall.

It The Thing That Wouldn't Die is a typical undead plant monster in the vein of Swamp Thing that may still be there after it seemingly parished. And then there Marcia Kenwell a germaphobe that became a part of a mutant roach hivemind. She or they may still exist to this day in the walls of a New York City highrise or tenament. A potential source of information or occult lore for PC's. And finally we get the succubus Satana Hellstrom former Defender, daughter to the Devil, sorcereress, and potentially either enemy or occult ally to the PC. Satana Hellstrom is a complex and deadly character to introduce into a Curtis style horror rpg game. One thing that I noticed right away of the The New Marvel Phile Issue #82 Curtis Horror is the morally grey area that these characters operate out of. These are characters whose brushes with Marvel's supernatural have left them broken, changed, and or fully demonic. Still this is a solid Marvel Halloween issue and highly recommended!