Evil Ernie

Evil Ernie, an undead psychotic killer, is a fictional comic-book character created by writer Brian Pulido and artist Steven Hughes in 1991 and originally published by Eternity Comics. Evil Ernie is currently published by Chaos! Comics and Devil's Due Publishing.

Ernest Fairchild

Ernest Fairchild is the root or core of Evil Ernie. Ernest Fairchild was a young boy who possessed the supernatural power to sketch scenes which would later come to pass, for instance he drew him and is family together with a little brother of his and several months later his mom became pregnant with their second son. Ernie originally had an enjoyable life; but, when his father became the town pariah because his superiors at the local lumber yard forced him to lay off many workers, things started to turn sour. Mr. Fairchild began to drink heavily and killed Ernest's pet rat, Smiley, in an inebriated fit of anger. This enraged Ernest and led to him drawing a picture of a car crashing into a tree. It just so happened that his mother was driving over to a local bar to pick up her husband while he was drawing this and ended up crashing into a tree just like in Ernest's sketch. In addition to suffering numerous injuries, she had a miscarriage of the fetus she was carrying, which caused her to slip into an abusive psychosis matching her husband's.

As his parents abused him, Ernest's powers developed further to where he could hear the thoughts of those around him and he discovered that many of his neighbors knew that he was being battered by his parents, but did nothing to help him. Either they had lost their jobs at the lumber yard and were too bitter to care or they still had their jobs, but were too afraid of losing them if they confronted his father.

Ernest's parents sought to "cure" him of his abilities and brought him to Dr. Leonard Price, who had been working on a behavioral therapy device dubbed the Dream Probe. Price, not knowing about the abuse Ernest was suffering, submitted him to his device, which sent him to the Endless Graveyard, where he met Lady Death. There, she offered to give him the love he so desperately desired if he killed everything on Earth. Once the treatment was over, Ernest pretended to be cured and went home with his parents, only to murder them the next morning along with thirty-five others before he was shot by Doctor Price, who had come to check in on him.

After this time he was incarcerated in a mental asylum, under the observation of Doctor Price, who blamed himself for Ernest's murder spree and vowed to make sure it never happened again. Doctor Price lost hope for Fairchild early on, but then a young female doctor named Mary Young invented a process of altering one's mind known as Neurotech. Despite Price's protests, Ernest was submitted to the Neurotech device. During the treatment, Lady Death used her telepathic link with him to cause the machine to explode, killing Ernest. When a nurse placed a smiley face pin intended to be a gift upon his release next to his corpse, Lady Death used it as a conduit for her arcane energy, transforming Ernest into the powerful, undead monster that would be known as Evil Ernie.

'Evil' Ernie Fairchild

Evil Ernie hereafter, along with his partner 'Smiley' (A psychotic smiley badge, which was once his pet rat) set about to cause 'Megadeath', which involved setting all of the USA's nuclear plethora on the rest of the world, so the rest of the world fires on itself (a sort of mutually assured destruction). Ernie sets to accomplish this by creating an army of zombies known as 'Dead onez'. Various adventures ensue, including a trip back to his past to confront his parents about their ill treatment of him, and a trip to hell to rebuke Pagan (the court jester of hell) for having Lady Death cast out into the void by Satan.

The culmination of Ernie's efforts amount to him causing Megadeath by causing the rest of the world to fire on itself with nuclear warheads from other various countries. Elsewhere the world has been earlier obliterated by nuclear strikes from various countries. Evil Ernie ends his life in a duel with Dr. Price, and in the last moment before the missiles hit, Ernie overpowers Price and turns him into a Dead One, exclaiming: Do you see it now? To which Price replies I see it, it's beau- Hereafter, both are dead. The very last scene is one of a mushroom cloud behind the survivors, bearing a facade of Ernie's face, grinning maniacally.

Hack/Slash, Santa Fe

After his death in his own world, Ernie would be reborn in the universe of Tim Seeley's HACK/Slash (in which no equivalent of him appears to exist). Discovering that Lady Death does not exist in this world, a depressed Ernie takes up residence in the Fairchild Sawmill in New Jersey and begins killing strippers and changing them into Dead Onez. Ernie would eventually encounter slasher slayer Cassie Hack and her partner Vlad and in the ensuing battle read Cassie's mind and fell in love with her, believing them to be two sides of the same coin. After Cassie is saved from him by Vlad, Ernie, wanting to impress Cassie, decides to purge the world of killers and breaks into the Clearview Mental Institution, planning to start his mission there. During his killing spree, Ernie is confronted by Cassie and Vlad and, while fighting the latter, is attacked by a recently arrived police officer. Killing the officer, Ernie discovers Cassie had accidentally been shot and, after she dies, Ernie sacrifices himself to revive her, causing him to die and be reborn elsewhere.

After the Hack/Slash crossover, the newly renewed license gained a new lease on life in the 4 issue mini-series Evil Ernie in Santa Fe. Written by Alan Grant and penciled by Tommy Castillo it featured Ernie in Santa Fe contemplating matters of fate after killing Norman Lowell, a lawyer who led Ernie against a Satanic cult performing rituals with connections to FastWay, a fast food franchise, while planning to sacrifice a child to demon Zabudel who granted wealth to their leader. All the while Ernie is chased by Dr. Price's daughter Layna who wants revenge partnered with detective Rig Dannon who's willing to catch Ernie for the million dollar reward.

Smiley

Throughout the series, Ernie's companion is Smiley, a wise-cracking smiley face button usually attached to the lapel of his jacket. Smiley serves as the conduit for the arcane energy that gives Ernie his powers, as well as the comic relief of the series. Smiley claims to be Ernie's super-ego and is sometimes at odds with his friend's decisions, such as when Ernie resurrected his parents in order to confront them about their past. For the most part, his personality is more easy-going and comical than Ernie's.

Powers

As Ernest Fairchild, he had the ability to sketch drawings of the future. This was first demonstrated when he drew a picture of a brand new washing machine being delivered shortly before one was delivered to his parents as a prize in a raffle they had not even entered. It seems that his ability could change the future since he once drew a picture of him and his future younger brother walking hand in hand when he heard his mother tell his father she was pregnant with a boy, only to prevent his younger brother from being born when he drew his mother's car crashing into a tree. Later on, he gained the ability to listen to the thoughts of others.

As Evil Ernie, he was extremely strong, practically unstoppable, thanks to the arcane energy of Lady Death. He could revive anyone he killed as loyal zombie follower in his army of the undead. When he was resurrected in Washington D.C., he was even more powerful. He could now resurrect the corpses of anyone nearby, whether he had killed them or not, and could manipulate arcane energy into powerful blasts to destroy his enemies, though he rarely used this ability since he preferred to be more "hands on" when it came to killing. He retained his telepathic abilities only to a small degree, which allowed him to speak to and see Lady Death after murdering someone or using astral projection to visit Hell while he slept. Though there's room for speculation on this as Purgatori once delved into his mind to find answers to a means as to defeat his patron saint and lover, Lady Death. She found the nightmarish images within his psyche were not figments of his imagining but were in fact materialized ghouls which threatened to devour her implicating he had some kind of power to will whatever he wised into reality.

The source of Evil Ernie's power comes from the arcane energy channeled into him by Lady Death through his button, Smiley. If Ernie is separated from Smiley, he begins to lose his power and becomes much weaker and, if apart from Smiley long enough, dies. In the revamp of the Evil mythos, Ernest's powers remain much the same but a tad more refined, if he wishes he could resume his initial living form before he was executed and has the innate psychic ability to peer into a persons moral alignment just as soon as he would look at them. it's also suggested that he is, on top of being human, a being of both angelic and demonic decent by another chaos lord; Mistress Hel.

Reboot

In October 2012, Dynamite Comics rebooted Evil Ernie. It was 6 issues; written by Jesse Blaze Snider and drawn by Jason Craig. Then two years later in October 2014 Dynamite Comics released volume 2; which was 6 issues; written by Tim Seeley & Steve Seeley and drawn by Rafael Lanhellas.^[1]

Origin of Evil

In the newest serialization, Ernest Fairchild was a child born from tragedy. The soon to be youngest son in a family of four as his mother went into labor a malicious entity possessed his father while they were driving her to the hospital killing everybody from his mother, father to older brother in a hideous car accident; the being later revealed to be Ernest's future compatriot Smiley. He would later be adopted to an abusive parental figure by the name of Bufford King, who would regularly accost him while his callous girlfriend, Eunice; never bothered to help him. For many years this was the make of Ernie's horrid life usually ending with him praying to God and Jesus every night; first for salvation of his new caretakers, then deliverance from their unsympathetic brutality, next to punishing them for the rot in their souls until finally he found a new patron to prey to seeing as neither were listening.

During his stay in the prison and before he became an inmate Ernest had the peculiar tendency of seeing the innermost aspects of a persons core being. he could see the morality of a another's character often viewing both the good and evil people around him in a different light. 5 years prior Fairchild had made a bargain with one of the many chaos lords in charge of running the darkside of the universe; Satan. In exchange for the power to purge the world of sinners he would sacrifice a good number of condemned souls. He poisoned the towns water supply with arsenic in a ritualistic killing, intoxicating them all moments before he would run over the then imprisoned Bufford's girlfriend with her own truck, unintentional but his first step to being remade. Making his way to the 'Widmark Maximum Security Prison' to see his cruel foster father, his final sacrifice. Upon meeting he proceeded to attack King with a shard of glass permanently disfiguring him.

Cut a couple of years to the future Ernie is now a death row prison inmate at the same penitentiary awaiting his execution via electric chair for his murderous acts dubbed by the local media as The Lucrecia Massacre of 2006. Crowds of people attending ranged from news castors to protesters, fanatics and civil rights activists participated in the festivities baring witness the event. All coming in accordance to this execution, with the dead man requesting he go out with his trademark leather jacket and infamous smiley faced button as a last request. Attending witnesses to his final moments are his grizzled father figure sporting glasgow grin who was let in by the corrupt pedophililic prison warden named Straw; who sat by drawing a sadistic glee while Ernie was regularly tormented by the other death row inmates. As well as his only friends in the joint, the kindly Doctor Thana Thomas and an empathetic pastor named Chaplain who he bonded with during his imprisonment. On the night of execution however, Ernest was reanimated by some kind of esoteric storm of sickly green magical energy which entered his cadaver bursting forth from his bowls. It burned his facial features into a gnarled lipless smile while his ordinarily inert yellow button suddenly sprang to life sporting a scowling facial expression and wicked toothy grin. Thus the jailbird turned deadman had been revived as the devils soul harbinger "Evil Ernie".

Seeking to finish off the ritual and his vendetta towards his estranged foster parent. Evil Ernie escaped the execution chamber and led a homicidal tirade against both the prisoners and the facility staff along with any other unfortunate sinner who happened to catch his vengeful eye. Experimenting with his newfound powers he tares through the penal area either slaughtering sinners in his eyes with unusually grizzly and vulgar flare while also sparing the few good individuals he came upon along the way, he would soon find however that reckless expenditure of his Arcane Energy which animates his corpse weakens him due to his having yet to complete his end of the devil deal. Due to this weakness he's eventually subdued and hideously maimed by his guardian leading the other inmates, but Smiley tricks Bufford into a new deal which costs him his right arm causing him to flee with the innocent doctor in tow.

Meanwhile outside the prisons borders a U.S. senator catches glimpses of Ernie's rampage at the prison after concluding business with a prostitute, utterly horrified by this turn of events he orders a gathering of military powers at the pentagon. Then moves to the white house speaking with the president of the United States convincing him that the threat the now demonic revenant posed required the nuclear option. Back at the prison Ernest is beset twice by Uriel the archangel of destiny to try and dissuade him from his murderous recourse, every time however they were dispatched either by Smiley who was hot-wiring a nearby corpse due to his allegiances to hell and not wanting Ernie to know the truth, and again by Bufford who had attached a severed arm of Fairchild's to himself gaining a portion of his undead son's demonic powers. After having been made vulnerable by Smiley getting damaged by a stray bullet Ernie is soon killed by bufford as he loses his connection to the Arcane Energy while trying to defend the host of innocent prisoners possessed by Uriel's followers, but Ernest is again resurrected with even greater power than before by an unknown force and follows up by reanimating an army of dead prisoners and bystanders who were at the prison to face his now demonized foster father. Still losing the fight against him as the evil power worked better than the kinder zombie kid, Evil managed to pull a hailmary by taking control of the arm Bufford severed making him rip out and eat his own heart.

Having managed to save Thana, Ernie is caught unawares when a nuke is dropped over the prison the two are currently occupying. unbeknownst to him the president had been possessed by Uriel who greenlit the bombing through his proxy. Ernest is soon revived by Smiley but his only friend is incinerated in the blast, cursing god just as everything was over; Ernie resigns to his fate as the devil's bounty hunter as he picks up Bufford's hat for himself and sets out to parts unknown.

Comics Timeline

Eternity Comics

Evil Ernie: 1-5 (1991)

Chaos Comics

Evil Ernie: Youth Gone Wild # 1-5 (1991-1992)

Evil Ernie: Resurrection # 1-4 (1993)

Evil Ernie: #0 (1993)

Evil Ernie: Revenge # 1-4 (1994)

Evil Ernie Vs. Superheroes (1995)

Evil Ernie: Straight to Hell Prologue (published by wizard) (1995)

Evil Ernie: Straight to Hell #1-5 (1995-1996)

Evil Ernie: # 1/2 (published by wizard) (1997)

Evil Ernie Vs. Movie Monster (1997)

Evil Ernie: Destroyer #1-9 (1997-1998)

Evil Ernie: # 1-4 (1998)

Evil Ernie Vs. Superheroes II (1998)

Evil Ernie: Monthly #1-10 (1998-1999)

Evil Ernie: Depraved # 1-3 (1999)

Evil Ernie: War of the Dead # 1-3 (1999)

Armageddon (preview) (1999)

Armageddon #1-4 (1999-2000)

Evil Ernie: Pieces of Me #1 (2000)

Evil Ernie: The Return #1 (2001)

The Untold tales of Evil Ernie: Relentless (2002)

Devil’s Due

Evil Ernie: In Santa Fe #1-4 (2005)

Hack/Slash: The Final Revenge of Evil Ernie (2005)

Dynamite

Evil Ernie: Origin of Evil 1-6 (2012)

Chaos! 1-6 (2014)

Chaos! Holiday Special #1 (2014)

Evil Ernie: Suicide King 1-6 (2014-2015)

Alice Cooper Vs. Chaos! 1-6 (2016)

Evil Ernie: Godeater 1-5 (2016)

Additional information

• Prior to her sale to CrossGen (and then Avatar Press), Lady Death was Ernie's lover.

See also

• List of Devil's Due Publishing publications

References

External links

• Evil Ernie at Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on June 26, 2016.