Journey Into Strange Tales! Atlas/ Marvel Horror Issue 47

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 32

December 1952 Part I

Everett

 Adventures Into Weird Worlds #13

"The Vampire Maker!" (a: Carmine Infantino) ★★★
(r: Uncanny Tales #4)
"You Devil, You!" (a: Don Rico) ★★
"I Died Tomorrow" (a: Don Perlin & Abe Simon) ★1/2
"Where Dead Men Walk!" (a: Jerry Robinson) ★★1/2

In a creaky old Hungarian castle, Dr. Gottfried awaits the lightning to give life to his greatest creation: the Vampire-Monster! But down in the village, a mob has gathered and is heading up the hill to destroy the mad doctor and his ghoulish creation. Luckily, the Doc has friends that can come to his aid; an army of vampire batmen delay the advance of the torch-bearing peasants long enough for the scientist to finish his work. The mob is more resourceful than expected and they defeat the batmen, smashing down the lab door just as Gottfried is about to throw the switch. A score of bullets riddle his body but the Doc manages to activate the machinery and the Vampire-Monster comes to life just as his creator dies at his feet. The frightened crowd flees as Gottfried's assistant holds the dead scientist's body and sighs that the peasants had no idea what they were doing. Gottfried had created a new species of creature, one who seeks out and destroys vampires!

"The Vampire Maker" is deliriously goofy fun but, if you stop and think about it, doesn't make much sense. Why would the vampire batmen safeguard the Doctor's castle ("...allies who want to see that his experiment is successfully completed...") if the nutty professor was creating a creature that would hunt them down and eradicate their kind? Infantino's vampires are hideous, creepy creatures with big tusks and bulging eyes; perfect for the atmosphere of this nutty little fable.

Satan tires of his overbearing wife and decides, with the help of a mask maker, to hunt for a gentler wife up-top. Things go well quickly and Lucifer falls for the gorgeous Wilma but when he pops the question she admits she's already married. Yep, she's Mrs. Satan, in disguise, on Earth to drag her simpering wimp of a hubby right back to Hell. "You Devil, You!" is an amusing change of pace with some really nice art from Don Rico. After contributing dynamite graphics for the Atlas titles, Rico became a novelist in the 1960s and created the three-book spy series, The Man From Pansy. As the title might indicate, Rico's hook was that Buzz Cardigan, his Pansy spy, was gay. Rico also penned several gothic and soft-porn novels for Lancer, including The Prisoner and The Girls of Sunset.

Jerry Robinson

"I Died Tomorrow" is another stale time-travel rip from EC, starring a greedy scientist who wants to rule the world with his recently-created time machine, but manages to visit the wrong era and ends up dinner for some Wolverton-esque monsters. In the finale, Stan Lee's "Where Dead Men Walk!," a college professor discovers a map to the lost city of Mu and, in the great tradition of all Atlas professors, decides the discovery will lead to great wealth and fame. The Professor enters the fabled city, located in a tunnel miles below the sea, and discovers that Mu is just another word for Hell! Stan's script is no great shakes (it's evident where this guy is going as soon as his true colors are revealed) but Jerry Robinson's detailed art is fantastic and some of Stan's dialogue is pretty funny:

Professor (at the door to Mu, facing the guardian of the city): Let me in or I'll blow your brains out!

Guardian: Well, you seem rather desperate about visiting our land!

Everett

 Journey Into Unknown Worlds #14

"The Lighthouse Guest" (a: George Tuska) ★★
"One of Our Graveyards is Missing!" 
(a: Basil Wolverton) ★★★
"One Little Mistake"★★
"The Scarecrow" (a: Bill Everett) ★★1/2
"The Spy" (a: Louis Zansky) ★1/2

A bank robber rows out to a secluded lighthouse, murders the keeper, and settles down to wait out the heat. Unfortunately, the killer gets a visit from the keeper's ghost, who informs him that he'll never leave the lighthouse alive. A nice splash, but the rest of the Tuska art is confined to talking heads and Stan Lee's "twist" at the climax (after spending years in the lighthouse, the killer is visited by a man who looks suspiciously like a younger version of himself) is murky. Still, "The Lighthouse Guest" is not a bad way to waste a few minutes.

Grave-digger Jeb goes off to have a beer and comes back to discover the entire graveyard has disappeared, leaving only a huge hole in the ground! The only clue is that there was a strange man with a scar on his face standing near the graveyard when Jeb went off for his liquid lunch. The stranger is found and brought to the police department, where he confesses he's a scout from Saturn and his scientists back home have stolen the graveyard to experiment on human bodies. The authorities demand the return of the resting place of their departed and promise anything in return. The Saturnian brings the entire cemetery back to Earth but at a price. "One of Our Graveyard is Missing!" is totally wonk and devoid of anything resembling reality but how can you not love something so out there? Incredibly enough, the daft script was written by none other than Daniel Keyes, who would write several "Confessions" stories for EC a few years later, and then go on to fame and fortune as the author of Flowers for Algernon (1959). This was the first of two Wolverton/Keyes team-ups for JIUW (the second arrives in the following issue and is equally goofy).

Franz is up to his eyes in gambling debt and the loan sharks are about to take their pay out of his flesh if he can't scrape together the 20Gs. Luckily, Franz's millionaire pop is on his death bead but, unluckily, brother Emil is in line for the inheritance. Franz suggests a nice hiking trip up a steep mountain and Emil happily agrees. When they get to the top, Franz shoves his brother over the side but, too late, remembers that they're tied together with a climbing rope! It's another variation on one of those overused warhorses but the uncredited writer puts a nice twist in the tale.

Elderly farmers, the Wilkens, are about to be foreclosed on by the heartless Mr. Droone but they've got a guardian angel in "The Scarecrow" which has magically sprung up in their cornfield. Many people will argue that clowns are the creepiest figures in horror literature but I'm firmly on the side of those who avow to the chilling powers of the scarecrow. We never even see the face of the titular bodyguard (Bill Everett wisely keeps him in shadow), but those panels that show him on his post in the field work their wonder just as well. "The Spy" is more red-baiting nonsense designed to show us American toddlers just how stupid and brutal the Soviets are.

Everett

 Adventures Into Terror #13

"Don't Try to Outsmart the Devil!" ★★
(a: Carmine Infantino)
(r: Vampire Tales #3)
"The Visitor" (a: George Roussos) ★
(r: Giant-Size Werewolf #3)
"The Hands of Death" (a: Don Perlin & Abe Simon) ★
(r: Giant-Size Werewolf #3)
"The Man Who Talked to Rats" (a: Manny Stallman) ★
(r: Giant-Size Werewolf #3)

Four sub-par tales this issue, with the opener being the only one with anything to recommend it. Carmine Infantino continues to impress me with his fabulous art (it's time to welcome Infantino into the "favored-artist" club, whose members include Heath, Sinnott, Wolverton, and Everett); it's atmospheric and noir-ish when it needs be and quiet and detailed at other times. The (rare 8-page) script is the same ol'-same ol' about a greedy old miser who loves gold so much he wants to live forever just to enjoy his riches. The devil grants the wicked old man's request that "his heart never stop beating" and you can guess the rest from there. Moral: "Don't Try to Outsmart the Devil!"

"The Visitor" is a meandering snoozer about a mist that or may not be a supernatural entity trying to keep its presence known to Earthlings. Only one man knows what's really going on but he's about to crack from the strain and no one will believe his crazy stories. Well, actually no one will have time to hear his stories anyway since the poor slob isn't introduced until the penultimate page. The mist just drifts around terrifying civilians for the first three pages. I like the work the Perlin/Simon team was pumping out and "The Hands of Death" is no exception. Couldn't stand Perlin's solo work in the 1970s but Abe Simon seems to have muted Perlin's bad habits when he was around. The splash, for instance, is quite effective (and looks quite different from most of the Atlas intros), maybe due to a lack of captions and a grim, violent scene. But the story is deadly dumb; a female reporter breaks down on a remote country lane and must take shelter in a creepy manor owned by a man disguised as a woman. Is this the infamous strangler the reporter was sent to do a piece on? No, but the real identity of the man and his inane expository will leave you cackling. Finally, and worst of all, is "The Man Who Talked to Rats," about a man who can control a horde of man-eating rats. The only interesting aspect of this tale (which meanders in the same way as "The Visitor") is that it predates the similarly-themed Ratman's Notebooks by more than a decade.

Adventures Into Terror #14 (Winter 1952)

"The Little People" (a: Tony DiPreta) ★★★
(r: Beware #6)
"The Hands" (a: Gene Colan) ★★
(r: Monsters Unleashed #4)
"Hex" (a: George Tuska) ★★1/2
(r: Beware #6)
"They're Driving Me Crazy!" ★★
(a: Dick Ayers and Ernie Bache)
(r: Monsters on the Prowl #28)

The Little family, the #1 act at the Bushman Brothers Circus, live in constant fear of their boss, the circus barker, a sadistic tyrant who beats and mistreats the family at the slightest provocation. But it was the barker that saved "The Little People" from prosecution when the cops broke in on Lon while he was attempting to operate on the Growth Glands of one of his siblings. But the barker goes too far one night when he cancels movie night and forces the Littles to rehearse their act. Tim Little heads off after the barker with his slingshot but, after a nasty altercation, ends dead from a broken neck. That's the camel that broke the straw's back as far as Lon Little is concerned; he dopes the barker and does a little circus surgery while he's out. The next day, the barker is... a real barker!

Here's a real nasty, sick gem with a Tod Browning's Freaks-inspired climax and some truly creepy DiPreat graphics. We've seen violent and twisted strips in the Atlas titles but "The Little People" has a genuine mean streak to it that I absolutely loved. And who'da thunk it was penned by Stan, who clearly has his tongue firmly in cheek with scenes like the Little family bust and ensuing courtroom panels.

Gary is born with claws instead of hands. Obviously, he feels as if he stands out in a crowd and all the poor guy wants is to be normal. All his friends at the "Men with Claws" club he frequents tell him to use be patient, change will come on his 25th birthday but Gary just can't wait. He sees a plastic surgeon who tells him that, for two grand, Gary can have normal hands. Not having the dough, the brash young man does what any brash young Atlas man would do: robbery and murder. New hands sewn on, Gary shows up at the "Men with Claws" function on the night of his 25th birthday to show off his fancy appendages. Unfortunately, at the stroke of midnight, Gary learns that his friends were right and he should have just waited a couple days longer. Now he's the only man-sized cockroach with human hands.

"Hex"

Gene Colan does his best not to spray coffee on his drawing board as the punch line is delivered but it must have been very hard for "gentleman" Gene to swallow his pride and pump out that final panel after delivering an otherwise flawlessly-noir art masterpiece. It's hard not to giggle though. And what kind of friends does Gary have? Can't these dopes just spit out what's going to happen to him on his birthday rather than hint around with mysterious "You'll be sorry, Gary" or "Just wait a little longer and your prayers will be answered" lines? I'd be interested in finding out how Gary ran across the "Men with Claws" club in the first place. Ad in the New York Times: "Got claws?" Unfortunately, the scan of AIT #14 I have is a patchwork of the reprinting and "The Claws" was reprinted in black and white in Monsters Unleashed. Fortunately, I think this might have been the ideal way to view this Colan art, without the distraction of color.

"Hex!" falls back on the "sadistic plantation foreman" plot but George Tuska does a nice job of spicing it up (something I'm not used to saying) and there's an effective twist in the tail. Alas, the same cannot be said of the final tale, "They're Driving Me Crazy!," about a scientist who makes a breakthrough in creating synthetic life. The egghead leaves his lab and discovers no one knows who he is as if his very existence has been erased. In the end, the professor discovers that man is ruled by beings in a shadow dimension who decide what will be and what will not be. Our poor schlub big brain has overstepped his boundaries and now will walk the Earth as "Anonymous." There's the germ of a very interesting hook in there somewhere but you can't help but wonder why the "rulers" don't just kill the scientist and avoid all the confusion and hassle. The full-page expository at the finale doesn't help either.

Heath

Marvel Tales #110

"The Empty Bus!" (a: Syd Shores)  ★★1/2
(r: Dead of Night #9)
"Harry's Hobby!"  ★
"Foolproof!" (a: Russ Heath)  ★★
(r: Strange Tales #174)
"Peter and the Puppet!" (a: Bill Benulis & Jack Abel)  ★
(r: Uncanny Tales #9)
"A Coffin for Carlos!" (a: Don Perlin & Abe Simon)  ★1/2
(r: Vault of Evil #18)

On his way to rub out a runaway wise guy, mobster Big Nick sits on an otherwise empty bus next to an old man who warns Nick to change his plans. The old man tells of a man he met on a previous journey who exited the bus to kill someone and was shot himself. Nick tells the old goat to shuddup and gets out at his station as planned.Of course, the twist is that the old man was foretelling Big Nick's future. At least, I think that's what was going on.

"The Empty Bus"

The plot is not entirely original (and variations would continue on down through the years), but it's not really the story that draws us into "The Empty Bus!" It's Syd Shores atmospheric art. You can almost feel the rain at the bus station. Shores might not have been the most stylish of artists but he was dependable (and would become an even more dependable inker for Marvel in the 1960s). The colorist looks like he/she was having a ball as well, with some wild choices for shading and color.

The rest of the far this issue is dismal stuff. "Harry's Hobby" sees henpecked Henry finding solace in crafting ships in bottles. Obese wife Stella can't abide by Harry having a good time so she destroys his collection and then becomes part of the collection when Harry snaps in an all too predictable (and impossibly stupid) finale. A landlord has a "Foolproof" way of making a profit off one of his buildings: by burning it to the ground. His "Fooolproof" plan (start the fire on the ground floor, race upstairs as an alibi, and call the fire department) runs into a bit of a problem after the blaze chases him up the stairs and he relaizes he has no change for the pay phone. A cute punch line and some nice (if undemanding) graphics by the Master.

"Peter and the Puppet" is the wooden (pardon the pun!) tale of a ventriloquist and his real-live talking dummy, Oscar. The two dopes fall in love with the same girl, but Peter decides she's for him and burns the puppet to cinders. Turns out the girl was a puppet too and had the hots for Oscar. Groooooan. Last up is "A Coffin for Carlos!," about a death-row inmate who's given a pill (by a grotesque one-eyed hunchback in a Fedora!) that will make him appear dead before his execution. The idea is he'll be dug up at the cemetery by his co-conspirator. As usual the plan goes wrong and the comatose Carlos ends up on the dissection table. Smells like some stale EC leftovers to me.

Everett

Journey Into Mystery #4

"The Bewitched Bike!" (a: Tony DiPreta) ★★
(r: Journey Into Mystery #8)
"Death Waits Within!" (a: Carl Hubbell) ★★
(r: Journey Into Mystery #8)
"The Locked Door! (a: Ed Winiarski) ★1/2
"I'm Drowning!" (a: George Roussos) ★
(r: Monsters on the Prowl #25)
"Hiding Place" (a: John Romita) ★

Bookie Spider kills bike shop owner and steals the loot and the titular bike, which turns out was made in 1992. Turns out the shop owner was traveling to the future, where he made his fortune. Spider tries it after a bank robbery and lands in the future only to find the bike guy is wanted for bank robbery. Nice twist climax and some snazzy DiPreta graphics.

In "Death Waits Within!," the Kumels seem such a nice old couple but they’re actually murdering the tenants of their BnB and sending the money to their son (who left home twenty years before) in America. Unfortunately for the murderous old birds, their latest victim turns out to be that long-gone son, who had popped 'round to surprise his folks!  Next up is "The Locked Door!," wherein a wanted murderer stops at an inn to rent a room. He gets his room but there’s a mysterious locked door that’s driving him nuts. The cops arrive and send the landlord up to get his new tenant. The guy strangles the old man and grabs the key to the door, opens it and reveals a brick wall behind it.

In the poorly-illustrated "I’m Drowning," a really dumb prisoner takes advantage of a nearing flood to dig his way out of his cell only to find the flooding worse underground. He decides to stick his finger in the leak a la a dyke and discovers too late that it’s a light socket! They didn’t make prison cells very good in those days. The final story in this very weak issue of Journey Into Mystery is "Hiding Place."  George really hates his brother, Harold, for always bringing snakes and spiders into the house. He vows he’ll find the place Harold hides his critters but doesn’t find it until he murders his brother. The hiding place was his own bed. Hmmm… quick funeral that, and the guy didn’t sleep in his own bed between the time he murdered his brother and the time he discovered his bed was the hiding place? Looks like John Romita was given only a couple hours to rush this one out. Uncharacteristic weak visuals from the master.

In just two weeks...
You'll learn the secret of
Men With Fangs!

Star Spangled DC War Stories Issue 168: January 1976

The DC War Comics
1959-1976
by Corporals Enfantino and Seabrook

Kubert

G.I. Combat 186

"Souvenir from a Headhunter"
Story by Robert Kanigher
Art by Sam Glanzman

"Medic in the Dark"
Story by Robert Kanigher
Art by Ric Estrada

Peter: The Haunted Tank is parachuted into the jungles of Burma to find a hidden Japanese rocket base. Safely landing, the boys make friends with a gorgeous native girl who takes them home to dad. Unfortunately, pop has old-fashioned ideas about men who lay hands on his (ostensibly) under-age daughter. Just as the boys are about to lose their heads (literally), gunfire erupts from the jungle and salvation arrives in the unlikely guise of Japanese soldiers. The boys escape but conquer the enemy and destroy the rocket base.

"Souvenir from a Headhunter"

Or at least, I think that's what happens since, I must admit, quite a bit of this rubbish was hard to follow. The writing in "Souvenir from a Headhunter" is almost as murky as the art. The Japanese "ambush" that saves our boys makes no sense whatsoever (it's almost as if the bad guys were just firing off their weapons for the hell of it and managed to lay lead on the chief as he's about to swing his sword), nor does most of the cockeyed action Glanzman plops into his panels. I don't presume to know enough about World War II to question Kanigher's use of the parachuting tank but I do cry "you got to be kidding" to the panels of the Jeb firing at approaching aircraft while 10,000 feet above the ground! Wouldn't the kickback knock them right out of the sky? I'm still a bit confused as to why the Jeb Stuart is the only tank that seems to be at every major battle in World War II.

A G.I. ambulance driver becomes a "Medic in the Dark" when the "hysterical blindness" that struck him as a child revisits at exactly the wrong time. The Army rejects this kid for his psychological problems but the Red Cross thinks it's okay for someone--who might black out when he's under pressure--to drive the wounded through battle zones? Um, yeah right.

"Medic in the Dark"

Jack: It's only January and already we have a candidate for worst story of the year: "Souvenir from a Headhunter." In addition to the problems you note, Peter, we have to put up with Leiya's offensive pidgin English. I can't imagine why Kanigher had to send the Haunted Tank to Burma, only to tell this idiotic story. I asked Google if tanks can be dropped by parachute and it seems the answer is yes, but only very close to the ground in areas where a plane can't land safely. The idea of the Jeb Stuart floating down from on high (and firing away in the meantime) is absurd. Not quite as bad--but close--is the backup story, "Medic in the Dark." Poor art, a story we've seen before, but still better than Glanzman in Burma. Sam had better watch out--no more Jack Kirby for us to kick around anymore!

Kubert

Our Army at War 288

"Defend--or Destroy!"
Story by Robert Kanigher
Art by Jack Lehti

"Medal of Honor"
Story and Art by Norman Maurer

Jack: After British paratroopers are wiped out trying to blow up a drawbridge that was supplying German soldiers holding a French port, Sgt. Rock and Easy Co. are sent to do the opposite job and hold the bridge, since the Navy plans to attack the port and the bridge is on the supply route. On the way to the bridge, a lone surviving British soldier joins up with Easy Co., but are they there to "Defend--or Destroy!"

Rock sends some of his men to attack a German ship and create a distraction that allows the rest of Easy Co. to attack the Germans holding the bridge. The German commander draws a bead on Rock but is pulled under the water by the British soldier, causing Rock later to raise a glass to his memory.

One of the less Kubert-y panels
from "Defend--or Destroy!"

Jack Lehti seems to have done a lot of newspaper comic strip work over the years, but seeing his name in a Sgt. Rock comic in 1976 is unexpected. I doubt we'll see him again in this series! The story itself is forgettable.

In June 1918, First Lieutenant Edouard Victor M. Izac displayed heroic behavior that resulted in another "Medal of Honor" being awarded. Izac was taken prisoner on a U-boat when his ship was sunk; he kept trying to escape until he was able to get out of a prison camp and make his way to Switzerland.

Norman Maurer is back with another run of the mill tale of heroism. I'm sure the real story was thrilling and inspiring, but it isn't told in a very exciting way and the art this issue is below par.

Peter: Even to my untrained eyes, it's obvious that Joe Kubert had a hand in helping Jack Lehti get his points across this issue. In the panels that look unassisted, Lehti comes off crude and sketchy (though nowhere near the extreme of Sam Glanzman). The story is decent, though nothing new. Unfortunately, I don't think we're going to see much in the way of originality in these strips anymore. "Medal of Honor" is informative and I guess that's the aim.

Kubert

Our Fighting Forces 163

"Assault on Satan's Skull!"
Story by Robert Kanigher
Art by Jack Lehti

Jack: The Losers are executed by firing squad and coffins containing their bodies are dropped from bomber planes flying over the English Channel. Fortunately, it was all a trick and the Losers are alive; they drop by parachute into the water and are picked up by a boat manned by German soldiers. The Losers quickly dispatch the enemy and head for French shores, each recalling the terrible incidents that led them to become a team.

Their present mission is to locate Dr. Tors Hanson, a scientist developing a rocket that can reach America. The Losers alone can identify him, so their execution was faked and they mount an "Assault on Satan's Skull!" to capture Hanson, who is located in a monastery nearby. They find two Dr. Hansons and take them both just to be safe. Making their way back to the boat manned by Captain Storm, the Losers run an enemy gauntlet with the two doctors in tow before making it safely back to the headquarters of General Thorne, who assigned them on the mission to begin with. The general's aide is revealed as a double agent when he kills the wrong Dr. Hanson, and the real Dr. Hanson has been brainwashed by the Germans and refuses to cooperate. Once again, the Losers manage to lose both versions of the doctor they sought!

Nah! Happens all the time!

It's such a relief to have Kirby off this strip that this book-length tale, even with some filler, is a welcome sight. Here's Jack Lehti for the second time this month, and his art is appealing in a primitive way. Best of all is having Kanigher back on script duties; even though there's nothing special about the story, its not an embarrassment like Kirby's stories were. Perhaps now the Losers can resume looking for Oona!

Peter: Why Big Bob feels the need to retell the Losers origin story is anyone's guess. If you put a gun to my head, I'd say it was to slam home the point that Kanigher was taking back the reins after a disastrous run by "The King." Though it's certainly more digestible than what Kirby wrought, Big Bob's script doesn't skimp on the outlandish. The parachuting coffins scene is ludicrous; there's no reason to take the subterfuge to such an extreme. Never mind the impossibility of activating your parachute while trapped in a coffin hurtling towards ground! Once the boys are out of sight of the traitor, they can go about their business in a much safer fashion. Are you telling me the pilot had no idea what was going on? Lehti seems to be flying solo here on this one (no Kubert trademarks that I can see) and, I have to say, the art is not half bad.

Kubert

Star Spangled War Stories 195

"The Deathmasters"
Story by David Michelinie
Art by Gerry Talaoc

"Duel in the Desert"
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Bill Draut

Peter: In part one of a two-part adventure, the Unknown Soldier is sent to a "School for Assassins" in Romania to impersonate budding Nazi killer Klaus Oster. Once undercover, the US is to destroy the compound and kill its commandant, Count Witschenbach. The Soldier safely ensconced in the academy, he befriends Witschenbach's pet killer, Ulrich Gherner, who confides in our hero that his father died from Nazi mistreatment and his mother desperately needs expensive medicine to keep her alive. The Nazis will pay Gherner for his "kills," so he's stuck performing atrocities for the men he'd rather be putting in the ground. Gherner is given the assignment to take out a Russian higher-up and the Soldier must follow. Before he begins his trip, he happily blows the School for Ratzi Murderers to hell!

"The Deathmasters"

"The Deathmasters" is one of the weaker Michelinie scripts so far, due to the fact that it seems quite similar to a couple other past adventures. I do like that, as is typical of Michelinie, the writer strays from the path he puts us on to beef up a sub-plot and make it the plot. We're not even sure that Witschenbach is at the academy when it goes blooey. Make no bones about it, a weak Michelinie story is still preferable to most of the other nonsense put before us this month. "Duel in the Desert" is just another tired Jack Oleck retread of a plot device we've seen countless times before: the Germans and the English clash over a Libyan waterhole in World War II. Neither side can win but both continue to fight until both sides are eliminated. If there is a light at the end of the tunnel, it's that Bill Draut is working his way up to becoming an average penciller.

Jack: I like the cliffhanger in "The Deathmasters," with the Unknown Soldier in his Nazi disguise racing into the midst of a ceremony and leaping into action, only to have the story end in mid jump! This is easily the best DC War series going at this point, with Michelinie and Talaoc working well together to tell one exciting story after another. It's the only war comic I really look forward to at this point. I agree with you about Draut's work on the backup--it's not bad.

"Duel in the Desert"

Next Week...
Jack and Peter attempt to
wade through the cheese.

Peter leads Jack ashore
after the December 1976 post.

The Hitchcock Project-Bill S. Ballinger Part Four: Escape to Sonoita [5.37]

by Jack Seabrook

Charlie and Bill are driving a tanker truck through the desert in southern Arizona when the radiator overheats and they have to stop, refill it with water, and wait for the engine to cool. Bill, the younger of the two, is frustrated and unhappy with the heat and the old truck; Charlie remarks that he has been "'haulin' loads to people out here since I was thirteen.'" Bill asks Charlie when he'll paint over the old "Maxwell Oil" logo and Charlie sees a cloud of dust that signals a car coming fast along the narrow track. The car tries to swerve around the stopped tanker truck and skids off the road, landing on a rock with a blown tires.

Bill opens the car door and finds a young girl in the back seat with tape over her mouth and more tape binding her wrists and ankles. She has been kidnapped by Tony and Larry, and Tony points a gun at Charlie and Bill, demanding to know how far they are from the Mexican border. Tony grazes a bullet off Bill's bicep and orders him to take the girl out of the car; Bill removes the tape from her mouth and gives her water from his water bag. Charlie, angry at the crooks for the way they have treated the girl, tells them where they are and goads Tony into leaving him, Bill, and the girl to die of thirst in the desert, rather than shooting them. Tony and Larry take the tanker truck and drive off.

"Escape to Sonoita"
was first published here

Charlie, Bill, and the girl sit in the shade of the car until the sun goes down, slaking their thirst by drinking water from the car's radiator and planning to walk to the highway in the cooler darkness. The next afternoon, a police car pulls up behind the stranded tanker truck and Charlie emerges with a policeman. They find Larry, shot to death and left alone in the cab. Charlie tells the policeman that Bill changed his mind on the walk to the highway and has decided to stay in business with Charlie. They deduce that Tony shot Larry and set off on foot with the nearly empty water bag when the old truck's radiator overheated and the engine seized up.

The policeman fills a water bag from a valve on the back of the tanker and remarks that Tony and Larry never knew that the truck was carrying 6000 gallons of water when they both died fighting over the small amount of water left in the bag. Charlie comments that he plans to have the truck repainted with a new logo: "'Davis and Son, Water Contractors.'"

"Escape to Sonoita," by James A. Howard, was first published in October 1959 issue of the British magazine Suspense. Clever and well-written, the story provides fair clues and benefits from a clear sense of place. The end holds dual surprises: first, that the tanker truck held a huge amount of water that would have saved the crooks from dying of thirst, and second, that Charlie and Bill, the bickering duo, are father and son.

Burt Reynolds as Bill

Almost all of the locations mentioned in the tale are real places that are easy to locate on a map. Charlie and Bill mention that they set out from Aguila, which is in south-west Arizona, not far from the Nevada border, and they drove along the highway before leaving the main road to drive into the desert on an unpaved track. The action in the story occurs at a spot called Hell's Basin, which appears to be fictional; the nearest town is said to be Ak Chin, an Indian village, and Tony and Larry's goal is to escape to Sonoita, where there is a border crossing into Mexico.

An editor's note in The Saint Mystery Magazine (September 1964), where the story was reprinted, mentions that the author, James A Howard (1922-2000), was a clinical psychologist practicing in Minnesota who had lived in the Southwest and presumably had some knowledge of the story's location. This is his only short story listed in the FictionMags Index but, in addition to psychology books, he wrote ten crime novels, eight of which were published between 1954 and 1961 and two of which appeared later, in 1981.

Murray Hamilton as Marsh

The story was adapted for Alfred Hitchcock Presents and was broadcast on CBS on Sunday, June 26, 1960. The teleplay is credited to James A. Howard and Bill Ballinger, which suggests that Howard turned in a teleplay that required enough revisions to bring in Ballinger to clean it up. The televised version of the story follows the printed version for the most part but contains one major change that allows the story to examine the crooks' personalities in an interesting way.

The truck's logo in the TV show is "Max Bell Oil Co.," not much different from the story's "Maxwell Oil." As usual, narrative passages in the story become dialogue in the TV show; Charlie is renamed Andy, while Tony and Larry are rechristened Marsh and Lemon. Marsh wears a dark suit and tie and is sadistic and smart, while Lemon, dressed more casually in a sports shirt and beret, is mentally slow, with three long scratches on his cheek. Those scratches came from Stephanie Thomas, a beautiful woman who replaces the kidnapped child of the story.

Venetia Stevenson as Stephanie

Did the producers (or the network censors) think it would be too harsh to show a kidnapped child in danger? Perhaps so, but whatever the reason, the teleplay uses this change to create sexual tension among the characters. Lemon displays a sexual interest in the woman and grabs her by the hair in a suggestive way to force her to take a drink of water from a suddenly phallic water bag. Bill jumps Lemon at this point and is hit in the back of the head with Marsh's gun, not shot in the bicep, as he is in the story. The odd sexual undercurrents continue: Marsh comments that Lemon had his chance with the woman earlier but couldn't make it, suggesting impotence, and Marsh then points his gun at Bill and urges him to kiss Stephanie. He changes his mind and tells Lemon to kiss her, then stops him; Marsh seems to get a thrill from the idea of Bill and Stephanie kissing.

James Bell as Andy

Marsh's sadism is played up and becomes part of Andy's calculus in goading the criminal not to shoot him and Bill; the teleplay also adds a lack of ammunition to the equation, since Marsh has only one bullet left in his gun and Lemon has two. The combination of the bullet shortage and the sadistic streak make the decision by Marsh not to shoot Andy and Bill more believable than it is in the story. It is Andy's knowledge and experience in the desert that saves the trio; as often happens, country wisdom trumps city smarts, with Marsh overestimating his own intelligence and allowing himself to be tricked by Andy.

The final scenes of the show are also slightly different than those in the short story. Bill insists on making the long walk through the desert to seek help but Andy slips away when Bill is not looking, leaving Bill to take care of Stephanie, the two young, attractive characters left together alone in the desert as darkness falls. Right after Andy disappears, Bill calls him "Dad" and we learn that the duo are father and son; the father has made a sacrifice for his child and we understand their relationship better. This secret was not disclosed until the very last sentence of the short story.

Harry Dean Stanton as Lemon

The other alteration comes when Andy and Bill (in the story, it's Charlie alone) come back the next day with two policemen (one in the story). The foursome find Lemon dead, lying in the desert, with a bullet through his head. They then drive to where they find the tanker truck, and there is a moment of suspense as they approach, thinking Marsh is inside with a gun. Instead, the cab is empty. Andy tries to crank the engine but it has seized; Bill tells him that "'All we need's a new engine, Dad, and we'll be back in business.'" In the story, Charlie tells the policeman that Bill changed his mind about staying in business with his father; in the TV show, the dialogue between father and son conveys the change of heart more directly.

Not far off, the policemen find Marsh dead, and there is a graphic shot of him lying in the desert, his eyes wide open. As in the story, the show ends with Andy commenting about repainting the truck, but this time the fact that it will read "Andy Davis and Son, Water Contractors" does not carry the surprise that it does on the printed page.

Robert Karnes as a policeman

Stuart Rosenberg (1927-2007) directs "Escape to Sonoita" skillfully, drawing fine performances out of all the actors and keeping the story moving along at a rapid clip. Rosenberg got his start directing TV shows in 1957 and worked in both TV and film until the late 1960s, when he became exclusively a film director. He directed five episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, the most recent of which was "Road Hog," also from a teleplay by Bill Ballinger.

Top billing goes to young Burt Reynolds (1936-2018), who had tried acting after a college football career was sidelined due to injuries. Reynolds began acting on TV in 1958 and this was his only appearance on the Hitchcock show. After his first film in 1961, Reynolds starred in a couple of TV series--Hawk (1966) and Dan August (1970-71)--before making a splash in the film Deliverance (1972) and becoming a major movie star. He was the world's number one box office star for five years in a row, from 1978 to 1982, and continued to make films and TV shows until his death.

Murray Hamilton (1923-1986) plays Marsh, the smarter of the two kidnappers. other than some uncredited film roles in 1944, his film and TV career spanned the years from 1951 to 1986. He appeared in just this one episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents and he was in an episode of The Twilight Zone and one of Night Gallery as well. Hamilton's two most famous parts were as Mr. Robinson in The Graduate (1967) and as the mayor in Jaws (1975).

George Dockstader as Roy

The beautiful Stephanie Thomas is played by Venetia Stevenson (1938- ), the daughter of film director Robert Stevenson. Born in London, she had a brief career on screen from 1954 to 1961 and this was her only appearance on the Hitchcock show. From 1962 to 1970, she was married to Don Everly, one of the singing Everly Brothers.

James Bell (1891-1973) gives a sensitive performance as Andy, Bill's father. He was on stage from 1920 and his screen career spanned the years from 1932 to 1963. He was in I Walked with a Zombie and The Leopard Man, both in 1943, but this was his only episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents.

Playing the mentally-challenged but lustful crook, Lemon, is Harry Dean Stanton (1926-2017), credited here as Dean Stanton. After serving in the Navy during WWII, he started acting on TV in 1954 and on film in 1956, with his first big screen role being an uncredited part in Hitchcock's The Wrong Man (1956). Stanton went on to become a popular and respected character actor in films such as Cool Hand Luke (1967), Wise Blood (1979), Alien (1979), Paris, Texas (1984), and Wild at Heart (1990). He was still making films at the time of his death.

The two police at the end of the episode are played by:

• Robert Karnes (1917-1979) as the lead cop; he is called Ted in the short story but not referred to by name in the TV show; Karnes was on screen from 1946 to 1980 and appeared in eight episodes of the Hitchcock show, including "A Little Sleep."
• George Dockstader (1914-1987) as Roy, the other cop; he was on screen from 1947 to 1974, often in uncredited roles. He was on the Hitchcock show three times, including "The Cadaver," and had an uncredited role in Psycho (1960).

"Escape to Sonoita" is available on DVD here or may be viewed for free online here. Read the GenreSnaps take on this episode here. Thanks to Peter Enfantino for providing a copy of the short story!

Sources:

"Escape to Sonoita." Alfred Hitchcock Presents, season 5, episode 37, CBS, 26 June 1960.

The FictionMags Index, www.philsp.com/homeville/FMI/0start.htm.

Grams, Martin, and Patrik Wikstrom. The Alfred Hitchcock Presents Companion. OTR Pub., 2001.

Howard, James A. "Escape to Sonoita." The Saint Mystery Magazine, Sept. 1964, pp. 116–126.

IMDb, IMDb.com, www.imdb.com/.

Pierce, J. Kingston. "PaperBack: 'Die on Easy Street.'" The Rap Sheet, 11 Nov. 2018, therapsheet.blogspot.com/2018/11/paperback-die-on-easy-street.html.

Stephensen-Payne, Phil. Galactic Central, philsp.com/.

Venetia Stevenson - The Private Life and Times of Venetia Stevenson. Venetia Stevenson Pictures., www.glamourgirlsofthesilverscreen.com/show/324/Venetia+Stevenson/index.html.

Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 24 Oct. 2019, www.wikipedia.org/.

In two weeks: Our look at Bill S. Ballinger's scripts for Alfred Hitchcock Presents wraps up with a discussion of "Deathmate," starring Lee Philips and Gia Scala!

The Warren Report Issue 20: September-November 1969

The Critical Guide to 

the Warren Illustrated Magazines

1964-1983

by Uncle Jack

& Cousin Peter

Frazetta

Vampirella #1 (September 1969)

"Vampirella of Draculon" ★★1/2
Story by Forrest J. Ackerman
Art by Tom Sutton

"Death Boat!" ★1/2
Story by Don Glut
Art by Billy Graham

"Two Silver Bullets!" ★★
Story by Don Glut
Art by Reed Crandall

"Goddess from the Sea" ★★
Story by Don Glut
Art by Neal Adams

"Last Act: October!" ★
Story by Don Glut
Art by Mike Royer

"Spaced-Out Girls!" ★
Story by Don Glut
Art by Tony Tallarico

"A Room Full of Changes" ★1/2
Story by Nicola Cuti
Art by Ernie Colon

On the planet Draculon, blood flows like water, so it's only natural that its inhabitants would be vampires. Now, due to a catastrophe caused by Draculon's twin suns, the blood has dried up on the planet and its citizens are in a panic. One of its prettier inhabitants is gorgeous Vampirella, a winged babe who just loves to fly around with nothing on but a smile. When a spaceship from (ostensibly) Earth crash-lands on Draculon, Vampirella discovers that the rich "H2O" that helps her survive flows through the astronaut's veins. Could this mean salvation for Draculon?

It's hard to take this as much more than it is, which is soft-soft-core tit-illation (see, I can do that just as well as Forry) aimed at pre- and young teens who can't get up the nerve to steal the Playboy from their dads' nightstands. "Vampirella of Draculon" is stuffed full of the same kind of puns and one-liners ("Smorgasblood!") Forrest J. Ackerman would use in the pages of Famous Monsters. If you don't stop to think about how inane the concept is, you might just enjoy the ride. Tom Sutton could certainly pencil a fabulous behind when he wanted to but there's not much else in the layouts to look at. If nothing else, "Draculon" is interesting in a Monday-Morning-Quarterback way, in that the whole vibe of Vampirella would completely change after a few issues, from the cornball puns to a more serious tone. For the better? We'll see. Vampi's costume, by the way, was designed by future comics artist Trina Robbins but only makes an appearance on the cover (it'll make its feature-length debut next issue). The vampish vampiress skits about in leggings and a halter when she wears anything at all. Her initial costume actually resembles what Gene Colan will whip up for Marvel's Lilith, Daughter of Dracula, a few years later.

"Death Boat!"

The sinking of a luxury liner leaves a handful of survivors left to drift in the middle of the ocean. As if the blazing sun and circling sharks weren't bad enough, it turns out there's a vampire on board the "Death Boat!" One by one, the castaways turn on each other until only one (gorgeous, bikini-clad) woman is left standing. Knowing she's not the vampire, the girl suddenly comes to the realization that it is the lifeboat itself that is the bloodsucker. Billy Graham's captivating art almost carries this one all the way through, but Don Glut's frankly silly climax sinks (Ulp! There goes Forry again!) the tale. As the sexy Angela ponders the man she's just stabbed to death to avoid exsanguination, doubt suddenly clouds her mind and the idea pops in her head that vampires were shape-shifters. The boat becomes a giant bat. Don Glut was a jack-of-all-trades (still is, as a matter of fact) in the 1960s and 1970s, spitting out scripts for Warren and Gold Key (the fan favorite Occult Files of Doctor Spektor), directing low-budget horror films, authoring the New Adventures of Frankenstein novels, as well as a handful of non-fiction tomes. Glut's The Frankenstein Legend (Scarecrow, 1973), an exhaustive survey of the Monster in films, TV, comics, and fiction, is one of the most enjoyable genre books ever written.

"Two Silver Bullets!"

Maria lives in a cabin deep in the Canadian wilderness with her father. One day, the gorgeous gal is attacked by a wolf and her father plants two rifle bullets squarely between its eyes. Miraculously, the creature runs off and Maria's father takes her back to their cabin to dress her wounds. Pop puts two and two together very quickly and is convinced his Maria has been bitten by a werewolf, so he sees a local Padre, who hands him "Two Silver Bullets!" and bids the man do God's work. That night, Maria sheds her nightgown and heads out into the snow to find her lupine lover. Papa comes upon the two wolves in the forest and fills them full of silver. A very simple tale with not much of a surprise (especially since the reveal is given away in the title), "Two Silver Bullets!" is recommended only for Reed Crandall's nice artwork. Some of these images almost look lifted whole from Crandall's EC days (the panel reprinted here sure looks like something from Shock SuspenStories, doesn't it?) and the weird "Maria and Pop living alone together out in the wilderness--wink wink" angle doubles that vibe.

"Goddess from the Sea"

One day at his beach house, Jim Judson has a visit from Lalora, a scantily-clad "Goddess from the Sea," informing him that she has escaped from Atlantis and is being followed by several nasty Atlanteans. Determined to save this delectable piece of womanhood from claws other than his own, Jim fights the seven scourges of Atlantis but watches helplessly as Lalora is dragged screaming into the sea. Jim follows, swimming down, down... only to discover that Lalora has lured him to his doom. Anything Neal Adams draws is infinitely better-looking than just about anything surrounding it but, heaven knows, Neal would get some turkey scripts now and then. Glut's juvenile prose (three of the Atlantean brutes are named Namlooc, Namelttil, and Namgib-- how clever!), chauvinist fantasy (Jim shows Lalora who's boss by planting one on her mere moments after meeting her), and cliched climax would make for impossible reading were it not for the talents of Mr. Adams. I like the fact that Adams leaves the art with a raw, almost unfinished look to it.

"Last Act: October!"

Meg Clayton is burned at the stake as a witch but, as her skin sears, she curses her executioner, Squire Pilkington, and his descendants to horrible deaths in October. Centuries later, the (ostensibly) last of the Pilkingtons, matronly Hortense, arrives at her babysitting gig on Halloween night. Since all of her relatives have died, as per the curse, in October, Hortense is hoping to see November 1st this year. Her employers startle her as they open the door, dressed in their Halloween party costumes, but she soon calms down and reads little Teddy a bedtime story. The precocious tot finally says his prayers and is out like a light but noises around the house have Hortense... tense. A little while later, Hortense checks in on the tyke and finds him restless, complaining of a terrible nightmare. Hortense leans in for a kiss goodnight and Teddy bares his fangs and his true identity. He's a vampire! "Last Act: October!" is a really dumb horror story that seems to have been whipped up in mere moments. There's no real flow between the events; who are Teddy's parents and why is Hortense so damn calm? Every one of her relatives has died a violent death in October (the time frame for these deaths is hazy--how many years have elapsed since Meg's burning?) and yet here she is, having a walkabout on October 31st! I'd be at the nearest police precinct in a padded cell. Mike Royer's art is very comic booky but, to his credit, he does find a way to subtly include that one scantily-clad-female panel required for each Vampirella story.

Boobies!!!
("Spaced-Out Girls!")

Things only get worse with Glut's fifth and final wet dream of the issue, "Spaced-Out Girls!," about a dopey "lady-killer" who stumbles onto a flying saucer populated by Playboy bunnies. They've come to Earth in search of a stud to take back to mate with their queen and re-populate their barren planet. With dreams of Raquel Welch running through his head,  this ninny volunteers to take the trip but, upon arrival, discovers the pin-up girls are robots and the queen is your typical Tony Tallarico monster. Somewhere in all my reading, I swear I read that Jim Warren wanted to create a title that would attract followers of the Women's Lib movement that had taken the country by storm and so Vampirella was born. Either I'm imagining things or Jim was winking and aiming at the lowest common denominator: the twelve year-old who hides girly mags under his mattress. Don Glut's low-budget films have always had that sleazy exploitation feel to them and his Warren scripts are just as icky.

"A Room Full of Changes"

The finale, "A Room Full of Changes," is an incomprehensible mish-mash that seems to have lost a page or two on the way to the printer. Writer Edward Blaine has just purchased the old Keil house, where once a vicious murder occurred. Blaine discovers that the crime has perverted the room where the murder took place; its four walls feed off its occupants' desires and, we find later, punish the guilty. Ernie Colon's art is not bad but Nick Cuti's pacing is erratic and (as noted) seems to be missing a few pieces here and there. We jump from event to event without proper explanation and the final panels resemble one of those Corman-Poe flicks where the castle burns down and the protagonists stand outside holding each other, knowing everything will be all right. The typos are horrendous (Blaine tells us in the opening panel: "I brought house lost in the country..." huh?) and Cuti falls into the same game Glut was playing, with his main character cuddling up to a perfect stranger minutes after meeting her. Still, this mess is preferable to the two gawdawful tales that preceded it. Not a stellar line-up for a premiere issue but then we're still mired in the Dark Age and, at least, we don't have to worry about reprints. This title will get much better in the future. I hope-Peter

Jack-Never having read an issue of Vampirella before today, I didn't know what to expect. Was the title character in every story? What the heck was she all about? After reading this mag, I kind of get it. "Vampirella of Draculon" is Ackerman corn with Good Girl Art by Sutton, not so much a story as a character introduction. Vampi then serves as the Uncle Creepy or Cousin Eerie for the rest of the issue, introducing each story and wrapping them up. Each artist draws her differently, including her costume, and the stories range from pretty good ("Two Silver Bullets!") to pretty bad ("Last Act: October!"), mainly depending on the artist. Neal Adams once again can't be bothered to ink his pencils, but when you have a new story by one of the all-time greats, who cares? Crandall's tale wins best in issue and I'm happy, for once, to read a Warren mag devoid of reprints.  I'm sure that Frazetta cover didn't hurt sales any!

Prezio

Eerie #24 (November 1969)

"Head for the Lighthouse!"★1/2
Story by Bill Parente
Art by Mike Royer

"Pursuit of the Vampire!"
(Reprinted from Creepy #1)

"The Immortality Seeker"★1/2
Story by James Haggenmiller
Art by Tom Sutton

"Checkmate"★★
Story by Ron Parker
Art by Bill Fraccio and Tony Tallarico

"Scavenger Hunt"★★
Story by Don Glut
Art by Jerry Grandenetti

"Dracula's Guest"
(Reprinted from Eerie #16)

"Wrong Tennant"★★1/2
Story by Bill Parente
Art by Reed Crandall

"Head for the Lighthouse!"

Old Ely Hatcher has manned the lighthouse for 28 years and enjoys regaling the local boys with tales of pirates and buried treasure. Folks in town want to replace the old lamp with a new model, meaning Ely will need to take a break for the first time in decades. He agrees with a lack of enthusiasm but the kids protest the idea. Ely then disappears and strange accidents plague the attempts to replace the beacon. Two men from the town committee decide to spend the night up in the top of the lighthouse to look out for trouble, since there's no light, and the shambling corpse of Ely decides to "Head for the Lighthouse!" The boys climb up and find one of the men has gone insane and the other is dead, his eyeless corpse serving as a beacon, providing light from the empty sockets.

It is a real challenge to try to summarize a Bill Parente script, and this one is no exception. The events jump around with no clear flow to the action and it takes effort to figure out what's going on. As in prior issues, the twist ending makes little sense. Mike Royer's art is serviceable but that's all.

Tom "Wally Wood" Sutton
("The Immortality Seeker")

Who is the lone space pilot who travels to a far-off world and zaps the first monster he sees? Why, he's "The Immortality Seeker!" Convinced that the secret to immortality lies somewhere in space, he kills a man and cobbles together a second-hand spaceship to blast off to Pluto and the moon! No, actually it's a distant planet, where he finds a super computer that grants him what he desires--just not in the way he expected.

For the most part, when the Warren mags try to tackle science fiction, it's a mess. This story is no exception. Tom Sutton draws a fairly cool giant spider/crab of a monster but gets nowhere in his attempt to copy Wally Wood's space stylings, especially in a panel on page five where the spaceman's face is half out of the picture. Haggenmiller is a better writer than Parente in that he can tell a coherent story, but the space jargon ("he inserted an ammo-cylinder into his nucleo-pistol") would've elicited groans from a reader of sci-fi pulps in the 1930s.

Fraccio and Tallarico give Satan a really bad complexion.
("Checkmate")

One rainy night, Jerry Richardson visits the decaying mansion (or "manshion") of his friend Edward Vanton, where Vanton invites him to a game of chess with the "legendary" Devil's Chessmen. The pieces are ghouls, vampires, and so on, with the king being Satan. Ed announces "Checkmate" and tells Jerry that the loser is claimed by Satan. Next thing you know, Jerry finds himself on the chessboard, being menaced by the monster pieces!

Expectations are at rock bottom at this point, so this story does not seem as bad as it would if it were surrounded by others of quality. It's basically an excuse to let our favorite art duo draw ghouls, zombies, etc., and the end is no great shock.

A groovy party is in full swing until it's crashed by Peter Enfantino Borgo, a monster fanatic who likes to pop fake fangs in his mouth and show off his collection of monster memorabilia. The guests have a great idea for Borgo, who offers to recite some dialogue from the Conan books. Instead, the guests propose a "Scavenger Hunt" and give Borgo a list of things to find, such as a ghoul's fingernail. He gamely heads off into the night and the guests laugh after he's gone. An hour before dawn Borgo returns, having found everything on the list, but he's accompanied by the monsters, who want it all back!

"Scavenger Hunt"

Don Glut and Jerry Grandenetti have a bit of fun with the monster kids reading Eerie and throw in various references to things their readers love (or Warren sells), such as horror story collections or Conan books. Grandenetti's art is as usual, though the guests at the swinging party seem a tad long in the tooth. All in all, it's mediocre fun and certainly not the low point of this issue.

Finnius Wiggers and his assistant, Dr. Eric Gordon, are ghost hunters who have rid unfortunate homes of over fifty ghosts. They visit the old Van Weeper house, where Lady Van Weeper lives, and find that it has a specter that haunts her for no apparent reason. The ghost hunters set up shop until, one night, Dr. Gordon is frightened to death. Finnius soldiers on and confronts the ghost, killing it with a jolt of electricity that also leaves him numb. He then discovers why the house was haunted: Lady Van Weeper is a vampire, the ghost was one of her victims who sought revenge, and she now plans to feast on Finnius!

"Wrong Tennant" (sic)

Kudos to Bill Parente for telling a reasonably lucid tale from start to finish, though the twist ending, in which a character is revealed to be a vampire, has been used approximately one zillion times already in the Warren mags. The real star here is Reed Crandall, whose art is stunning. It's too bad Crandall came to such a sad end, since he was a great comic artist and could've contributed wonderful work to one of the bigger companies. Did I mention that Parente misspells a word in the story's title and then again in a word balloon? I can't explain it.-Jack

Peter-"Lighthouse" is just straight-up stupid, with no motivating factor behind Ely’s vengeful resurrection. These guys didn’t shoot Ely’s dog or rape his woman; they simply realized that technology made for a more effective and safer lighthouse. More and more, I know exactly what I’m going to run into by reading a Parente script. "Immortality" isn’t perfect but it is the best thing I’ve read in a Warren funny book in months. Tom Sutton is given that room to breathe I keep harping on and James Haggenmiller delivers a nicely ironic punch at tale’s end. Tallarico delivers the world’s least frightening chess pieces in "Checkmate" (that vampire bat looks suspiciously like an owl!), a story with a climax so confusing you’ll doubt your own sanity! "Scavenger Hunt" won’t show up on any "Best of the Year" lists but it’s easily the most enjoyable of the several Glut stories we’ve read this week. The author peppers the tale with tons of genre references and I’m a sucker for that kind of wink-wink. "Dracula’s Guest" is another yawner from the Pyramid collection, a paperback I wisely avoided as a youth. Imagine Reed Crandall, hoping for a script just a fraction as good as the foundations he received back in the EC days, sent the latest Bill Parente claptrap and shuffling, crestfallen, back to his drawing board. Reed, to his credit, still pumped out better-than-average graphics.

Bill Hughes

Creepy #30 (November 1969)

"The Mind of the Monster"  ★1/2
Story by R. Michael Rosen
Art by Ernie Colon

"Drop In!" ★1/2
Story by Don Glut
Art by Tom Sutton

"The Haunted Sky"
(Reprinted from Creepy #17)

"The River"
(Reprinted from Creepy #15)

"To Be or Not To Be a Witch" ★
Story by Bill Parente
Art by Carlos Prunes

"Piece by Piece"
(Reprinted from Creepy #14)

"Dr. Jekyll's Jest" ★
Story by R. Michael Rosen
Art by Mike Royer

"The Mind of the Monster"

Professor Timmons is tasked with finding a way to destroy the giant monster on Mars that keeps wiping out our astronauts. After spending weeks in his laboratory, Timmons hits on a solution: he creates a three-headed monster out of dead bodies and household appliances, sure to defeat the creature on Mars. Things don't go as planned, though, when he rolls his new invention out before Army brass and Timmons discovers what devious schemes are lurking within "The Mind of the Monster."

Harmless but enormously dumb on several levels. For one, if you send six crews of men to Mars and every one of them is wiped out, don't go to Mars! Two, how does Timmons's huge tri-domed hulk resemble anything the scientist dug up from the local cemetery (and that's a hoot as well--the professor who's given the most important assignment in America has to do his own grave-digging!)? Timmons in no way looks like your average sci-fi scientist, unless that egghead is Ed Asner. I do like Colon's creature design, despite its improbability factor, but his human characters always have some kind of acromegaly in their facial features. Timmons almost seems to have a weird smile on his face, as though he's enjoying the futility of the situation.

"As the mystics and statistics say it will!"

Los Angeles will slide into the sea, everybody knows, but psychic/author Paulivius Dittmeyer (think Uncle Creepy in a three-piece) has written a book predicting the very hour that the city of debauchery will make its descent. The hour arrives and the city is pert near barren but the few remaining spectators watch as the streets crack open and... Satan emerges! Random? Yes, but so is everything else about this script. A rock 'n' roll band is introduced at the onset and then just disappears. The paranoia seems to grow out of nowhere and then we're introduced to Dittmeyer who's, ostensibly, taken advantage of the situation to make money. Or has he? Does he have Satan's unlisted number? Did he really pick up psychic messages via "a peculiar smell of ectoplasm?" Or is it all just one big coincidence? Tom Sutton's supremely goofy art is the only reason to keep turning those pages.

Nathaniel Beck believes himself to be possessed by a demon, so he journeys to the home of a witch in order to be cured. Rebecca Sutter, rumored to be a witch, lives with her father in a remote cabin. When Nathaniel arrives and begs her for help, she and her father get to work. But, it turns out, 'Becca and her pop are charlatans, fooling the local populace for financial gain. They stretch Nathaniel on a rack and rob him of his gold but Beck prevails in the end when he reveals himself to be an actual demon!

"To Be or Not To Be a Witch"

Oh boy, "To Be or Not to Be a Witch" made my head hurt. I had to read it twice to make sense of the climax and that only made me mad at myself for wasting the effort. The reveal (Nathaniel is actually the devil going door-to-door to weed out actual witches) is head-scratching and just plain dumb. The devil comes off as such a weakling and dunderhead in these early Warren zines. Newcomer Carlos Prunes contributes a more-than-adequate job of penciling (though his demon is obviously ripped-off from Curse of the...), one of the first of the "Selecciones Illustradas" artists to contribute to Warren. This was Prunes's only American work but it definitely contains more than a hint of what was to come.

Tod is convinced that the genius, Dr. Sikh, is a brutal butcher who delights in administering pain so he goes to his best friend, Dr. Jekyll (nephew of the real deal), to help him get to the truth. Turns out Jekyll has perfected his uncle's formula and is Dr. Sikh. I hear you whispering, "So what?" Exactly. Uncle Creepy is kind enough to give away the big reveal of "Dr. Jekyll's Jest" in his opening monologue so there really is no reason to waste ten minutes with this tripe. In the time of awful issues, this is truly an awful issue.-Peter

Host Peter Enfantino was supposed to select a panel that perfectly
captured the feel of "Dr. Jekyll's Jest" but he fell asleep and the
bare*bones office custodian was kind enough to fill in

Jack-Thanks for clarifying the ending of "Dr. Jekyll's Jest," Peter. I really did not get it when I read it. That's become increasingly common as we slog through the Dark Age of Warren. "The Mind of the Monster" features a bad idea with confusing execution and the climax falls flat. It's R. Michael Rosen's first credit and he should've kept practicing. "Drop In!" has some unintentional humor with the groovy '60s band, but that's about it; Sutton's art is not up to his usual level. The art by Prunes in "To Be or Not To Be a Witch" is impressive and I wonder why he did not do any more work in the U.S. Parente's script is terrible, as usual--things just happen one after another with no reason.

Next Week...
So does a new team on The Losers
spell success?