The Warren Report Issue 107: September 1979

 

 

The Critical Guide to

the Warren Illustrated Magazines

1964-1979

by Uncle Jack

& Cousin Peter

Sanjulian and McQuaite

Vampirella #81

"Vampirella and the Alien Amazon" ★1/2

Story by Bill DuBay

Art by Pablo Marcos

"Scourge of the Dragon Queen" ★★

Story by Bill DuBay

Art by Gonzalo Mayo

"...And Be a Bride of Chaos"

(Reprinted from Vampirella #16, April 1972)

"Dracula Still Lives!"

(Reprinted from Vampirella #18, August 1972)

Captured by Slandra and zipping across the universe, Pantha and Vampirella are forced to listen to the scantily-clad Alien Amazon while she recounts the history of war between her planet and Drakulon. 

History lesson complete, Slandra is drawn to the bridge by a cryptic message from her AI pilot. Just as she leaves, the demon N'Gorath appears and frees the girls. Vampi heads to the bridge to confront Slandra and meets up with her in the hallway while Pantha destroys the Amazon's AI pilot. Vampi and Slandra have a vicious battle, with Vampi coming out on top, but the outcome of Pantha's hissy fit over the controls is that the ship is now in self-destruct mode. Vampi insists on saving Slandra (to end the centuries-old war) but the Amazon is more intent on wiping the girls' memory of the history of war. 

Pantha and Vampi escape the dying ship in a rescue pod just in time and head for Earth. Immediately upon splash-down, Vampirella visits the recovering Pendragon and thanks him for sending N'Gorath to rescue her. Pen begs Vampi to pray for him. He's out of gin.

At least a third of "Vampirella and the Alien Amazon" is given over to a history flashback. Once we've been educated, there's not much room to tell a story and the narrative just flops like a dead fish. I couldn't understand why Slandra would be sent out into space to search for surviving Drakulons out of revenge when the war was essentially started by her people. The finale with Vampi and Pen is weepy and maudlin and Pen's "life-altering sacrifice" will doubtless be forgotten by Dube within a couple issues. I've almost forgotten it already. I've already given my thoughts on Marcos's art on Vampi (and elsewhere, for that matter) and nothing's changed. Slandra, Vampi, and Pantha pose with their asses in strange contorted ways all through the story. It's a 13-year-old's wet dream but for us old-timers it's just a mess.

When she discovers that Pen and Pantha have been kidnapped by pirates, Vampirella makes it her goal in life to rescue her friends, but her poor, tiny wings become tired and she dips into the drink. Luckily, once she passes out, her leathery form transforms back into that of a supermodel, a form easily visible to a Chinese Navy ship. Once on board, Vampi discovers the stinkin' Commies are going to take her back to base and torture her for secrets of American Intelligence. 

Laughing, she changes back into a bat and flutters away and very soon comes across the hideout of the pirates. She unties Pantha (who changes into her animal form) and the two terrorize the bad guys. Most of the pirates head back to their junk and set sail, but Vampi puts the kibosh on their escape and they crash into a conveniently-placed set of rocks, killing all aboard. 

Pantha hypnotizes Robbins, the surviving pirate, into taking them to the ship of the Dragon Queen, who sees the approaching boat and realizes what's going on. She ducks down into a lower deck to hide. Vampi boards and hears a terrifying scream from below and enters the room just as a huge dragon emerges from the shadows. Believing the creature to be (duh!) the Dragon Queen, Vampi prepares for battle but then watches as it transforms back into its human shape, that of the Queen's assistant, Sin Tsung. The old man relates the story of his only son dying from heroin acquired from the Dragon Queen. He swore revenge and now that revenge is his.

Drama over, Vampi returns to shore, where she finds a very hands-on Adam Van Helsing, who calls her mid-1970s sobriquets such as "Lover" and "Baby." Hiding her disgust at the dopey stalker, she holds his hand and they walk into the sunset, unaware that their next adventure has already happened.

That's because "Scourge of the Dragon Queen" takes place before the events of "Alien Amazon," thanks to the United States Postal Service or whoever Dube decides to blame from month to month for delays. I'd love to see a chronology of these arcs as there must be months between events for these globe-hoppers. The story and art here are certainly better than "Alien Amazon," but I wouldn't go overboard and recommend that anyone actually read the thing. It's confusing as all get out, sometimes due to the cast of characters, sometimes due to Mayo's pose-heavy art.

We learn that Conrad Van Helsing's telepathic abilities have grown so fine-tuned that he can "feel" a barge coming into the harbor with heroin stashed aboard. Now that's some power! And... just thinking out loud here... why does Pantha need Vampi to untie her so that she can transform into a panther? Does she have wrist bracelets like Wonder Woman? And if Vampi can hypnotize Robbins into doing her bidding, why doesn't she use that power more often? Inquiring minds want to know. 

For some reason, Warren blessed us with two Vampi almost-annuals this year, this issue and Vampi #83. The two reprints are not bottom of the barrel, but they're certainly not top-notch graphic entertainment. The former is Archie's swan song for the series and the latter kicked off the Dracula arc.-Peter

Jack-The best thing I can say about this issue of Vampirella is that it was a quick read. I think DuBay was trying to explain why Pantha's people and Vampi's people both inhabited Drakulon, but the history lesson is rather confusing. The art by Marcos is okay and the story is fair at best, but overall it's a weak conclusion to an unremarkable saga. "Dragon Queen" is worse and I found it nearly unreadable, mainly due to the horrible art by Mayo. He just doesn't have much of an ability to tell a story in panels. My favorite part was when the Commie exclaimed, "Marx preserve us!" The reprints are mid-level Vampi; I called the first unsatisfying when we reviewed that issue and I wrote that the second featured poor writing and gorgeous art. It's a shame we now have Marcos and Mayo rather than Gonzalez drawing Vampi.

Duane Allen

Creepy #111

"Dreams of Grandeur" ★★★

Story by Budd Lewis

Art by Val Mayerik & Klaus Janson

"A Stiff Named Sczynsky" ★1/2

Story by Bob Toomey

Art by Rafael Auraleon

"Heart of the Warrior" ★★

Story by Bill DuBay

Art by Alejandro Sanchez

"Blood-Lust" ★

Story by Cary Bates

Art by Leo Duranona

"Night Wind" ★

Story by Masanabo Sato & Bob Toomey

Art by Masanabo Sato

"A Switch in Dime" ★1/2

Story by Nicola Cuti

Art by Leo Duranona

Working in the Areo boiler room is anything but exciting for nebbish Grunder Belkn, but one day, while daydreaming, the little man finds he can "visit" the brain of ace Areo pilot Captain Janathan and experience what it's like to fly through space. The only problem is that, when Grunder cohabits Janathan's brain, the pilot's senses overload and he can't use his masterful flying skills. The jaunts become more and more dangerous. 

When Grunder slips and reveals his true identity, Janathan corners him in the boiler room and beats him to a pulp. Bad move since, very soon after, Grunder's psychic skills could save Janathan's life. An anomaly at late 1970s' Warren: an entertaining fantasy! The plot of "Dreams of Grandeur," that of cohabitation of one brain, seems very familiar, but Budd Lewis puts a humorous spin on the trope and the results are delightful. The meshing of Mayerik and Janson is an interesting one; it doesn't always work, but it gets the job done. There are times when I saw only Mayerik and other times when it seemed only Janson was visible.

It's 1967. There's a ghoul on the loose aboard a Navy hospital ship off the coast of South Vietnam and bodies are starting to disappear from the morgue. When the guilty party is revealed, one of his victims rises from the dead (maybe) and guts him with a bayonet (we think). "A Stiff Named Sczynsky" is a very simple, very stupid tale that has no underlying themes or unpredictable twists to throw the reader off. It's the art that may lead to trouble walking down the path. Auraleon's characters all look alike, so it's hard at times to figure out who is who. Writer Bob Toomey must have figured that would be a problem since he has the body-muncher utter a catch phrase about the morgue being "so damn cold." Where does Sczynsky's body (or spirit?) go once he's done the deed on his defiler? That climax is more than a bit confusing.

Gorraz the Warrior has returned after months of toiling in the Zolarian Border Wars and he needs a frothy pint of ale and a warm bed shared with his favorite barkeep, Shira. He finds both at the Red Dragon Inn but, before he can indulge in his busty maiden, she is stolen away by a griffin. Gorraz learns that the village has come under the bloody rule of a wizard named Krothar and he swears by the Beard of Bathsheba that the warlock's head shall soon be separated from his body. 

But the trek is much more dangerous than Gorraz imagined, since the wizard is tracking the barbarian's trek and hurling monster after monster in his path. Finally, he enters Krothar's castle and the magician confesses that he could have killed Gorraz at any point but needed to test the warrior's mettle. He hypnotizes Gorraz, cuts his heart out, and gleefully adds it to the other ingredients required to cook up a spell of evil.

Barbarians in search of lost girlfriends was a genre returned to so many times by the Warren writers over the years, I'd forgive anyone who didn't finish "Heart of the Warrior." But the twist is actually a good one, a surprise for once. An extra couple of  panels detailing just what the sorcerer was conjuring up might have been overkill; this way we're left to wonder if the villagers will become mindless zombies and Shira the new queen of magic. You might think it thoughtful of Krothar to leave Shira with a sports bra (despite stealing the rest of her clothing), but Daniel Horne (in Gathering Horror) informs us that a few of the panels in "Heart of a Warrior" were inexplicably censored. 

In the future, the vampire population has boomed to such extraordinary levels that a Vampire Elimination Board has been created. Their premier agent, Wilma Jennel, has become adept at seeking out and destroying blood-suckers through a specially-formulated serum in her blood that kills vampires within ten seconds of ingestion.

But Wilma has grown tired of the VEB life and wants to retire. Her boss, Mr. Cryker, assures his ace agent that, once she takes care of this final assignment, her duty will be done. But that last target will be legendary: Count Dracula himself! Wilma woos and wins the heart of the king of the undead but finds herself falling in love. She calls Dracula and warns him, but the vampire surprises her by confessing that he knew her secret all along; in fact, he's created an antidote that makes him immune to the virus in Wilma's blood. Now, if she will allow, he can take a bite and transform his love into a creature of the night; they can "live" together forever. Unfortunately, Mr. Cryker anticipated Wilma's treachery and replaced her blood with fluid laced with garlic. Dracula unwittingly takes a bite and both he and Wilma are dead dead.

"Blood-Lust" is extremely hokey, the kind of story that sometimes might be so bad it's good. Not this time out; the plot is loaded with logic holes (if a vampire bites Wilma's jugular, wouldn't she be in a bit of trouble? Wouldn't the marks be left to warn off future vampire victims?) and the dreaded multi-panel expository done the clunky way (two characters sit in a room and have a very long conversation regarding events they already know about). But add to all this inanity Leo Duranona's ugly penciling and ink blotches and you've got yourself something no one in their right mind should bother with.

"Night Wind" is some sort of incomprehensible muck about a female warrior, clad in mail, who rescues her sister from a castle dungeon and then must face an evil demon or two. Why this is set in a post-apocalyptic future (we know this because of the goofy splash picturing the Statue of Liberty sharing a giant chasm with a half-dozen skyscrapers, surrounded by what appears to be either water or fire) is anyone's guess. Thankfully, there's no dialogue and very few words stuck in caption boxes, so we can get the gist of what might have been had the Sato/Toomey team been a bit more verbose (What is done is done and done again. The sparks consume themselves within a living core of darkness, and still more sparks are struck against the night, flashing briefly in the glow of their own extinction.). Sato seems, at times, to have struggled with bodily proportions; here, the mailed maiden's head seems to be larger than her body.

Merz is a scientist working on a machine that could revolutionize traveling through dimensions. He switches on his gizmo and is sucked into our world, trading places with a vagrant who's about to start work at a carnival. Merz, meet the carnival; hobo, meet the other place. All the usual shenanigans you'd expect from a Cuti script occur and all the dark icky graphics you'd expect from a Duranona job materialize before your tired, weary eyes. "A Switch in Dime" is the perfect capper for a generally miserable issue of Creepy-Peter

Jack-Everything is relative as we edge closer to the end of our Warren quest. Compared to a good issue of Creepy, this is poor, yet compared to this month's Vampirella, it's not bad. "Dreams of Grandeur" was best, despite the somewhat confusing narrative, the odd art pairing, and the letdown of an ending. I kind of liked the art in "Heart of the Warrior," a story where I couldn't tell from one page to the next if DuBay was trying to satirize the subject or not. "Night Wind" wasn't awful, it just didn't have much substance. I did like seeing a female knight for a change.

"A Stiff Named Sczynsky" was disgusting and weird with art that made normal characters appear diseased. Naturally, the two stories drawn by Duranona were the worst. "Blood-Lust" was too long but at least it had some interesting twists and turns; "A Switch in Dime" seemed much longer than 11 pages and the twist ending wasn't worth the buildup.

Kirk Reinert

Eerie #104

"The Trouble With Tin Men!"★★1/2

Story by Bill DuBay

Art by Alfredo Alcala & Jim Janes

"Dusk"★1/2

Story by Don McGregor

Art by Paul Gulacy

"City of Shadows"★

Story by Jean Michelle Martin

Art by Leo Duranona

"Beastworld [I]"★★1/2

Story by Bruce Jones

Art by Pablo Marcos

"Vladimir"★★

Story by Bob Toomey

Art by Jose Ortiz

"Temple of the Ravagers"★1/2

Story by Leo Duranona & Cary Bates

Art by Leo Duranona

Restin Dane heads off to the time factory and leaves Bishop and Manners behind, knowing full well that they'll hop into a time castle and travel. Restin finds the factory in chaos, under siege from a band of renegade work robots, while Bishop and Manners are transported into the future, where they come under attack by spaceships. Similar events play out in present and future and Restin discovers that the dangerous Mandroid has escaped!

If there's one thing I can say about stories written by Bill DuBay, it's that they're overwritten. "The Trouble with Tin Men!" runs 11 pages but seems more like 20. It's yet another Rook tale where Restin is in one place and Bishop is in another; there are lots of Star Wars-like characters and pieces of flying hardware but not much plot. As seems to be the norm in 1979 Warren mags, the story is continued next issue, but so little suspense is created that I'm not anxious to find out what happens next. At least the art, by Alcala and Janes, is above average--too bad it's wasted on this script.

Rebecca Cope argues with her disfigured husband Harris as Dr. Cavanagh is led away by Rurik and Rush, the security guards wearing dark sunglasses. Harris shoves Rebecca down a flight of stairs when she utters one too many truths; Cavanagh awakens in the wine cellar and finds that he shares it with Kelsey, who explains that Rebecca is dying of leukemia and Harris is acting out. It seems the house was built on a radioactive waste dump! Rebecca suddenly appears and leads Cavanagh and Kelsey outside to freedom, but as they cross a rickety bridge that is suspended over a salt marsh they are menaced by a rifle wielded by one of the twin security guards. A struggle ensues, the bridge breaks, and all fall into the water as alligators approach and chow down on the guard. Rebecca and Cavanagh turn to see her house in flames!

Blecch. I used to like Paul Gulacy's art, but it's awfully stiff in "Dusk" and the photo swipes are egregious. Once again, Cavanagh is James Coburn. Don McGregor's pretentious prose and heavy-handed treatment of his subject makes for slow reading. Not surprisingly, the story is continued next issue.

Khari, Ragan, and Aussa search a sandy wasteland for the City of Dreams. They survive attacks by dragons and bats, but Ragan is done in by a sandstorm. Finally, after a day's journey, the wind dies down and Khari and Aussi find the remnants of Manhattan, which has been buried for centuries.

Good Lord, have we finally reached the absolute bottom? This six-page waste of newsprint titled "City of Shadows" is truly awful and looks like Leo Duranona posed "action figures" (dolls), photographed them, and drew some of his special doodles to create one of the dumbest stories I've ever read. The "surprise" ending, where Manhattan is revealed under the shifting sands, is laughable. Jean Michelle Martin is quickly speeding past Bates, Cuti, and DuBay to become the worst writer at Warren. That's an accomplishment!

Handsome, smart, musclebound Tyler Callwell and his gorgeous girlfriend Monica Benchly fly 6000 light years to visit Tyler's college pal Peter Thomas, who lives on "Beastworld." Peter introduces Tyler and Monica to his super-hot wife Ruth and flatters Tyler; Peter even has a scrapbook detailing all of Tyler's exploits. Tyler and Monica's drinks are drugged and they pass out. Monica awakens with Peter, dressed in different clothes and left out in the wilderness, where she is quickly attacked by a giant, flying beetle. Peter kills the beast. Meanwhile, Tyler awakens and Ruth warns him not to go after Peter, but he ignores her entreaties and takes her to find his girl.

Yet another story cut off in the middle! It seems that Louise Jones didn't care where the stories were divided, since they often don't end at any particular point of suspense or rising action. Instead, they just stop, with a note that they will be continued next issue. When I saw that this one was written by Bruce Jones I had a glimmer of hope that it might be decent, and it's okay, but that's about it. The Marcos art is the usual, with every male character handsome and full of muscles, while every female character is beautiful and perfectly proportioned. The story seems like a retread of The Most Dangerous Game. We'll see how it comes out next time.

"Vladimir" and Nikolai, a two-headed man, is/are floating along in a hot air balloon. They land and meet a horseman with a jade arm; he asks to buy their balloon and takes it by force when they refuse to sell. He leaves his horse and floats off into the air. Vladimir and Nikolai are approached by Moonshadow and his companion, Arianne, who explain that their horse was killed two hours before by a man in a similar balloon. After some quick sword fighting, the trio/quartet take off in another hot air balloon.

Moonshadow explains that the man with the jade arm is Francois, who led the League of Assassins. Their balloon heads off over the mountains and above the sea, where a storm rages briefly. Soon, a cauldron of bats attack; they are the bat-people whose leader Moonshadow killed. The bats grab Moonshadow and Arianne grabs his feet and hangs on. They are flown out over the waves and dropped into the sea. The two-headed man floats away in his/their balloon.

I really like Jose Ortiz's art and it seems like he gives it the old college try most every time, even when handed a script like this that is filled with nonsense. Why is there a two-headed man? Why does the other man have a jade arm? What does it all mean? Beats me. The events seem to follow one after another without any purpose. Still, the pages look nice and it's not like a DuBay story where the dialogue and captions take an eon to plow through.

Allison and Jesse march on through the desert and Jesse carries the aged Merlin on his back. They come upon the wreckage of an ancient ship that must have sunk when water covered the area. Jesse leaves Merlin under a lean-to and he and Allison explore the ship, finding only the remains of a hanged man. Atop a nearby hill they see the ruins of a temple; inside, Allison falls through some rotted floorboards and is captured by a band of wild cannibal women. Jesse continues to explore the "Temple of the Ravagers" and is soon captured himself. Only by pretending to be ill are the duo spared the indignity of becoming a meal; the cannibal women fly into a rage and kill each other. Allison and Jesse head back to find Merlin.

The Horizon Seekers keep seeking the horizon and finding one dumb thing after another. Leo Duranona keeps scratching out page after page of ugly, uninspired panels. When will it end? The final page says the saga will be concluded in Eerie #105. Here's hoping.-Jack

Peter-The Rook is, as always, slow, talky, and hard to follow. All I got from this one is that Dube really wants to recreate a Marvel comic book from the mid-'70s and rip off Star Wars at the same time. Ergo, Manners's insufferable C-3PO dialogue and the new robot guy who's a dead ringer for Thanos. If this was a Marvel funny book in the mid-'70s, it wouldn't have made it past the fourth issue. 

Part two of "The Trespasser" is a bloated, pretentious mess, even more so than its opening chapter. I don't have the time or energy to see if McGregor swiped any of the dialogue from a Yeats poem, but it sure smells flowery to me. Gulacy's borrowing of James Coburn's face (I'd say likeness but there's nothing sorta-kinda about this... it's a swipe) has become annoying, but not as annoying as his lifeless choreography. And we still have a conclusion to wade through.

I used to stage my Mego dolls just like Leo Duranona does in "City of Shadows," but no one paid me for it. I think I might have been able to come up with a more original story (certainly a more original twist) than "Damn you all to hell!" "Beastworld" is Bruce Jones slumming it in mindless superhero fashion. The dialogue is eye-rolling ("Take your hands off me, you Jovian mind worm filth!"), but the series has something of a good rep out there so I'll give it another shot. What are my options, anyway? I can't stand to look at these Pablo Marcos gods and goddesses anymore; it makes me wonder why I liked his stuff over at Marvel. 

"The Open Sky: Vladimir" is easily the best thing in this issue; it's an oddball story filled with weird characters and events that seem to happen randomly and with no purpose. And yet, it all works for me. The story is engaging and the art is top-notch. There will be one more installment of "The Open Sky" (in #110) which, I assume, will flow into the events that took place way back in Moonshadow, Chapter One (in Eerie #91). I may just take a gander at that last piece of the puzzle at some point. Four Duranonas in one month is entirely too much for my system. To be fair, I knew I wouldn't like "Temple of the Ravagers" because nothing in the series before it was remotely interesting. Therefore, it did not disappoint.

Thanks, but no thanks!

Next Week...
Batman finds himself
face-to-face with...
The Cult?