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The first time I heard of 30 Days of Night, it was 2007 as I sat in the movie theater watching the film. I suspect this is how lots of people heard of it, which is actually a three-issue comic book series published by IDW. Not only was I impressed that IDW had a title that actually made it to the big screen, but also that it starred pretty-boy Josh Hartnett.
Naturally after the 30 Days of Night comic series from 2002 began to demand a respectable amount of change (Affiliate Link), IDW decided to create a follow-up series subtitled Bloodsucker Tales in 2004. The difference between the two? The second time around, no one cared. An eight-issued story called “Dead Billy Dead” was apparently both the first and last of the series.
I discovered 30 Days of Night: Blood Suckers through a grab bag, which happens to be my favorite way of discovering new and old comic books. Issue 6 wound up in my hands as I read through the short and fragmented story. Something about a doctor cutting open a vampire to see why he was immortal. He hypothesized that being a vampire is sort of like having cancer, where cells reproduce indefinitely. Whatever.
If the goal of the movie was to inspire people to read the source material, it certainly peaked my interest. However I am sure that it was to take advantage of the vampire trend that movies like Underworld were creating buzz for. Either way, 30 Days of Night seems to have been the only series from IDW that created enough interest to ever be made into a major blockbuster movie. Frankly, they tend to work the other way around: wait until a movie or series has already been established, then offer to create spin-off stories to further develop the franchise. As the fourth largest comic book publisher in the United States, they have certainly carved themselves a comfortable niche. In my opinion though, it would be nice to see them venturing again into something more original.