7. Tatuaje The Bride
Tatuaje Cigars, Inc.
- Country of Origin: Nicaragua
- Factory: My Father Cigars S.A.
- Wrapper: U.S.A. (Connecticut Broadleaf Rosado)
- Binder: Nicaragua
- Filler: Nicaragua
- Length: 7 1/8 Inches
- Ring Gauge: 49
- Vitola: Churchill
- MSRP: $13 (Boxes of 13, $169)
- Release Date: Sept. 29, 2018
- Number of Cigars Released: 666 Dress Boxes of 13 Cigars & 4,500 Plain Boxes of 10 Cigars (53,658 Total Cigars)
- Original Score: 91
And then there were none.
Since 2008, Tatuaje has released a new cigar in the company's Monster Series, which included 666 hand-numbered 13-count "dress boxes" covered in art inspired by the specific movie monster being celebrated. The aforementioned Monsters being commemorated ran the gamut from classics: Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Wolfman—to more modern entries—Michael Myers from the Halloween movies, Jason Voorhees from the Friday the 13th movies and Freddy Krueger from A Nightmare on Elm Street movies. Inside each dress box were 13 cigars priced at $13 each with the majority of dress boxes sent to 13 different retailers every year. (There's a theme here.)
While some of the additions to the series were a bit surprising, the final entry should not have been: since the series started with a release inspired by Frankenstein, the 13th addition was none other than The Bride, based on the character in James Whale’s movie The Bride of Frankenstein that debuted in 1935. The 7 1/8 x 49 Churchill extra is composed of a Connecticut broadleaf rosado wrapper covering both a binder and filler tobaccos from Nicaragua, one of only three releases in the series to use that wrapper leaf following The Frank in 2008 and The JV13 in 2013.
While it is bittersweet to enjoy these cigars knowing it was the last one to be released—at least in this form, as Tatuaje has indicated that it is likely that the Monster Series will continue on in some way after 2018—the final entry was easily good enough to make it to the seventh spot on our Top 25 list this year. — Brooks Whittington.
