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Join Clawberry And Friends In The Campfire Horror Story “The Rottening”

the rottening

What kind of horror stories will a strawberry tell? Apparently, some really graphic ones about carving out the insides of zombie pumpkins for Halloween decoration purposes. Welcome to The Misadventures of Clawberry and Friends: Tales From The Compost. Clawberry is an adorably spooky strawberry who tells the story of The Rottening. And yes, there will be more food-based puns incoming because this comic is enabling me. See if you can spot all of them?

The Rottening comes in at a nice twenty-four pages of content. We follow Clawberry, a strawberry with a claw extending out of his body. Three unique friends join him in this quest: Bookworm, Miggy, and Toey. The entire comic revolves around the gang telling berry scary campfire stories, with The Rottening being one of Clawberry’s tales. Clawberry’s quite a wonderful narrator as well! There’s even a page in the comic dedicated to teaching readers how to draw him. I love it when artists plant the seeds for fanart. I know I want to give it a try at some point!

If the campfire ghost story isn’t enough of a clue, this comic teeters on the side of horror. However, these characters mix creepy and cute at a perfect balance to not truly strike as horror. Sure, it’s graphic – but you’ll only be scared if you hate pumpkin carving, rotting pumpkin corpses or dismemberment. Why dismemberment? Well, Toey just so happens to be a dismembered toe. An adorable dismembered toe who ends up being my favorite of the group, mind you. But a dismembered toe nonetheless.

Let’s be honest. It’s a little weird for a strawberry to be talking to an earthworm, a dismembered toe, and a…radish? I’m not sure what Miggy is, actually. Let’s go with radish so that Clawberry has a food-based friend. At first, it’s unsettling seeing all of these little guys telling campfire stories. Toey especially makes me question a lot of things, considering she’s a toe amongst fruits and edibles. Even Bookworm makes sense in the grand scheme of things, since worms help with gardens and such. But Toey’s existence really makes you question something. Where are all the humans? Obviously, Toey is a human toe. So where are the rest of the humans? Did these sentient little food monsters take over? It’s not a jarring question, and trying to answer it never takes me out of the story. But you toe-tally can’t tell me it’s not fun to think about.

Taking a deviation from the great toe debacle, this world is so incredibly charming! The art style definitely plays into the creepy-cute vibes. Clawberry, Toey, Miggy and Bookworm are all very visually pleasing to look at. If I don’t know any better, I would guess this is a horror spin-off of Plants vs Zombies. The art style feels like the zombie side, and the characters themselves feel like the plants! I mean, come on! Look at the image at the top and tell me you don’t see the resemblance. In any case, I love this art style so much; it really fits this world and its story. Seriously, I’m eating this art style up.

Overall, The Rottening is a creepy-but-cute tale of fruits telling ghost stories. If you’re into stories that are scary and fun, this comic’s right for you! There’s also no blood or gore in this comic unless you count pumpkin guts. Even though Clawberry’s the focus, all of his friends are equally wonderful and well-developed. Their interactions are super cute! My only warning for this comic is simple: you won’t think of pumpkin carving the same way again if you read this. I know I’ll be keeping an eye out for zombie pumpkins in the future!

The Misadventures of Clawberry and Friends: Tales From The Compost Book One: The Rottening is available on Crisishour’s website. The Rottening is only $4.99 USD, which is a steal! There’s also tons of other comics and merchandise available on the site, so I highly recommend checking it out. What did you think of The Rottening? What adventures are you hoping Clawberry and Friends get into next? Let us know in the comments or send us your thoughts on Facebook or Twitter!

About the author

Kayleigh Clark