Welcome back to the Festival of Dread, The Splintering’s month-long celebration of all things creepy and crawly.

The fellas over at 656 Comics recently launched a pair of second-chance crowdfunding campaigns for The Cryptidnals, a 132-page, black and white graphic novel originally crowdfunded on Indiegogo in 2021.

Written by Ray Ramos and featuring illustrations by Dario Rodriguez, The Cryptidnals combines myth, monsters, and a visually dynamic aesthetic inspired by Junji Ito and Gustav Dore.

Here’s the official plot synopsis taken from The Cryptidnals Indiegogo campaign page:

Monsters of Mesoamerican myth such as La Llorona, legends of Texas like the Lake Worth Goatman, and oddities such as the immortal San Elizario Man-dog. Creatures that have been claimed to exist but have never been proven… These monsters are what our fear of the dark is based upon.

But what if the legends are truer than we believe? What if these abnormalities have their own secret society? From ancient supernatural deities to Cthulhuian horror that has been present before the dawn of man? Furthermore, what if that society is being threatened by new atrocities arising from the ethereal realm of cyberspace, with evil TULPAS, like the malevolent El Ñango and the heinous Rake, and more sinister beings, these emanations have been created through the power of belief!

Enter THE CRYPTIDNALS. Monsters who have been criminalized by human society for existing and the only hope for mankind.

THE CRYPTIDNALS is a 148-page, black and white graphic novel that merges cryptids, Mesoamerican deities, Lovecraftian horror & creepypasta seamlessly into something unseen in comics! Written by Ray Ramos and illustrated by Darío Rodríguez. Channeling the horror and macabre elements of Poe and Lovecraft and the artistic stylings of Junji Ito, Kentaro Miura, and Gustav Dore.

Backers can get a copy of The Cryptidnals for $25. If you have more money to spend, you can also pick up the following tchotchkes and extras:

• Multiple copies of the book
• Variant covers
• Sketch covers
• A glow-in-the-dark cover (Kickstarter only)
• Proof copies
• An enamel pin
• Original sketches
• Man-Dog Unleashed supplemental book
• Creature Apocryphal behind-the-scenes sketchbook
• Monster Moments scrapbook
• A copy of the original Cryptidnals pitch book to Alterna Comics

It is also worth noting that there is an additional shipping charge starting at $10 for those in the United States.

Intrigued? You can check out some sample artwork below or visit the full Cryptidnals Indiegogo campaign page here, and the Kickstarter campaign here. You can also check out our review of the book here as written by George Travlos (spoilers: he rather enjoyed it).

Thanks for reading!

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