Francisco Haghenbeck

Francisco Haghenbeck (1965 – 4 April 2021) was a Mexican novelist and comic book writer, best known for his English-language work on the horror series *Crimson* for Image Comics. Born in Mexico City, he studied architecture before turning to writing, and his path into comics came through an early collaboration with artist Humberto Ramos. Together, they created *Crimson*, a dark fantasy series about a young man turned into a vampire, which ran from 1998 to 2001. Haghenbeck wrote the bulk of the series, including its spin-offs *Crimson: Scarlet X: Blood on the Moon* and the *Crimson Sourcebook*, and also contributed to *Superman Annual*. His style blended supernatural horror with a distinctly Latin American sensibility, often exploring themes of identity and redemption. Later in life, he shifted primarily to prose fiction, earning acclaim for novels like *The Secret Book of Frida Kahlo* and *The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire*. He received the 2012 International Latino Book Award for his novel *El código de la vida*. Haghenbeck’s legacy in comics remains tied to his inventive, character-driven horror work, which helped define the late-1990s Image Comics horror boom. He died on 4 April 2021.