Do You Dare Enter The Final Post? November/December 1976 + The Big Wrap-Up!

The DC Mystery Anthologies 1968-1976

by Peter Enfantino and
Jack Seabrook

Jack Sparling & Vince Colletta

House of Mystery 247

"The Game of Death"
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Steve Ditko and Wayne Howard

"The Ghost of Deadman's Breach!"
Story by Arnold Drake
Art by Jess Jodloman

Peter: Matt is Big Kahuna on the board at his local beach, the only surfer able to survive "Baker's Breach," twin columns of deadly rock just offshore, but then comes Gary, slick San Fran boy who bursts Matt's bubble. When a big-time promoter sees the two split the uprights one afternoon, he offers them a deal: they have a surf-off and the survivor gets the big payday, all broadcast before "20,000,000 spectators." Even though he's promised his girl, Fay, that he'll never tempt Baker's Breach again, the amount of greenbacks placed in front of Matt is just too tempting and he agrees. The night before the match, Matt invites his competition to the beach for a bit of a boxing match to clear the air between them but events take a nasty turn when Matt accidentally kills Gary. He buries the body on the beach and shows up to the big game the next day. The show must go on, according to the promoter, and so Matt surfs alone. Well, he thinks he's alone but, lo and behold, a second foam rider appears beside him: the ghost of Gary. Needless to say, Matt's surfing career ended that day.

"The Ghost of Deadman's Breach"

"The Ghost of Deadman's Breach" is not a great story but it's not a bad one either; a bit of a Rocky III on the beach (with a ghost), complete with Gary telling Fay that, when the match is over, she should trade up. Jess Jodloman's art is hit and miss, with some panels gloriously creepy (very reminiscent of Alfredo Alcala) and some stiff and awkward. I highly doubt you'd have twenty million viewers tune in to such a niche and local event and it's an odd choice to have Gary's ghost fully clothed on his surfboard but then the whole thing is silly if you think about it. So don't think about it.

Jack will surely disagree but Steve Ditko's art on the opening story shows, once again, that the artist's skills had declined severely since his heyday in the mid- to late-60s. Jack Oleck rolls out the second most over-used character in the DC horror universe (the first being the swamp witch, of course), the heartless big-game hunter, and adds absolutely nothing new to that sub-genre. The ending is really silly and, yes, I tried not to think about it... but I couldn't help it.

Ditko's Doldrums

Jack: I don't really see a decline from mid-'60s Marvel Ditko to mid-'70s DC Ditko; the Marvel work is over-rated while the DC work is under-rated. I don't think Wayne Howard is the best choice of artists to ink the great Ditko. The story is run of the mill until the last couple of pages when it gets kind of crazy and fun. Strangest of all is the offhand way that the main character is killed; I had to look back to make sure I understood what happened!

"Deadman's Breach" is very good Oleck and the usual from Jodloman. As you note, his art is hit or miss, sometimes from one panel to another. We have remarked before on his ability to draw luscious women, and a story where most of the gals are in bikinis lets Jess do what he does best. He even provides a helping of beefcake for the rare female reader to enjoy. His problem often seems to be with faces seen in close-up; his characters' teeth are often quite strange.

Ernie Chua

The House of Secrets 142

"Who Goes There?"
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Ernesto Patricio

"Food for Thought!"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by Leopoldo Duranona

"Playmate"
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Bill Draut

Peter: Anne Mason is being stalked by a specter, one who haunts Anne's dreams and threatens to destroy her sanity. When a psychiatrist recommends that Anne's husband, George, take the frazzled woman for a change of scenery, the couple head overseas. The dreams disappear but, ominously, on a "quiet English road," Anne spots the house from her nightmares and convinces George to buy the house so that she can get to the bottom of her haunts. One night, the ghost comes to Anne in her dreams and the frightened girl flees from her bed and falls to her death from the staircase. As she watches her husband weep over her broken body, Anne realizes that the specter was herself.

Surprise!

"Who Goes There" perfectly encapsulates this entire issue of House of Secrets (and, for the most part, the last couple years of the DC mystery line); it's a mess of cliches laden with mediocre art. I know we've read this exact story before because I've previously wondered aloud at the stupidity of someone buying a house that was part of their own night haunts. Why would George think purchasing a place that was driving his wife insane was a good idea? Why was Anne's (future) spirit haunting her? Why wouldn't it warn her instead? Oleck's script and Patricio's art are by-the-numbers, resembling one of those Gothic romance tales we were subjected to a few years before. "Food for Thought" and "Playmate" are also written around ideas that should have been taken out behind the woodshed and shot in the head rather than warmed up in the microwave, with "Playmate" being especially nauseous and maudlin. It's the antithesis of the classic "Nightmare" (also written, tellingly, by Oleck), in which the special needs kid is lured out of his shell by supernatural means. Syrupy and stupid, "Playmate" is a sad ending to our coverage of House of Secrets, a title which had its ups and downs but also presented, arguably, the single most important horror story in DC history.

Pathetic "Playmate"

Jack: "Who Goes There?" has sub-par art and a twist ending that is obvious from the start. "Food for Thought!" has slightly better art but a predictable story; once again, the man who can't be killed is subjected to a living Hell. "Playmate" has the best art of the three, which is a low bar indeed, and a distasteful story. If this is the best they could do, why bring HOS back from cancellation?

Uncredited

The Witching Hour 66

"A Scream in the Attic"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Fred Carrillo

"The Night Visitor"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by Jose Delbo

"Half a Killer is Better Than None"
Story Uncredited
Art by Ernesto Patricio

Jack: Mark and Karen Balcher are at the home of another couple playing cards when a TV news flash alerts them that a lunatic has escaped from the state insane asylum. They see a photo of their beloved babysitter on the TV and race home, thinking their son Robbie is in danger. Meanwhile, Mattie, the aging sitter, is watching little Robbie when Bruno arrives, determined to take her back to the asylum. Mattie grabs Robbie and makes for the attic, while Bruno gives chase and lunges for her. He misses, pitches out an open window, and dies in his fall to the ground, just as Robbie's parents' friends pull up in front of the house, having missed "A Scream in the Attic." It seems they jumped to conclusions: Bruno was the lunatic and Mattie was someone he liked; for saving Robbie, she is invited to live with the Balchers.

Kids sure stayed up late with the babysitter in the '70s.

As usual, the story is filled with strange twists and turns and unexplained coincidences. The best I can figure is that Mattie actually was in the asylum but was cured and discharged. Bruno was a nut case who got to know Mattie at the asylum. The headlong flight out of the attic window stretches the bounds of belief, and the parents' overly dramatic car ride home is tough to take, but this is at least a bearable story, something I can't say for the two that follow it in this issue.

"We have to race home. Our child is in danger.
Should we stop for a drink first?"

Peter: Bearable? Oh Jack, you've been working too hard. I blame myself for the inevitable lapse in sanity. "Scream in the Attic" could well be the worst story of the year but, thankfully, we've agreed that this last year is so dreadful we won't be doing a Best of or Worst of 1976 overview. I love the second panel of the first page where Mark calmly hands his wife her coat so they can get home and stop the babysitter from vivisecting their helpless child. As for the runner-up for worst of the issue, "The Night Visitor" makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Who is the mysterious cigar-chomping Mr. Morke? If George Kashdan doesn't care, why should we? It's hard to remember a worse waste of time than Witching Hour #50.

Jack Sparling & Vince Colletta

Unexpected 176

"Having a Wonderful Crime"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by E.R. Cruz

"What Haunted Herbert"
Story by Al Case (Murray Boltinoff)
Art by Jess Jodloman

"Escape to Treachery"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by Gerry Talaoc

Jack:

Dear Mom and Dad,

I'm "Having a Wonderful Crime" at summer camp. Last night, some of the older boys dressed up like skeletons and got me and my bunkmate Freddy out of bed. They put us through an initiation where we had to do all kinds of gross things like squeezing and squashing human eyeballs. Then they had us dig graves for each other! I got worried when I tripped and accidentally buried Freddy alive, but the counselor told me it was just a prank. We all went back to the gravesite but, UNEXPECTEDLY, the older boys forgot to un-bury Freddy. Know what? He was dead! I guess I'll get a new bunkmate now.

Love,

Roy

Peter: While Jack is taking a much needed rest, I'll just let you know that "Escape to Treachery" is not too bad. It's the story of rebel Pedro, who is tricked by his doctor into thinking he has only a few weeks to live and so plots to assassinate "El Presidente." There are a whole lot of twists and turns here and just the fact that the script made me think wins this the Best of the Month award (against really lousy competition, mind you).

Ernie Chan & Vince Colletta

The House of Mystery 248

"The Night Jamie Gave Up the Ghost"
Story by David Michelinie
Art by Luis Dominguez

"The Vampire"
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Ruben Yandoc

Peter: I'd love to be able to report that our House of Mystery coverage ends with a bang rather than a whimper but... "The Night Jamie..." is a so-so tale of a vengeful ghost with harmful intentions that has a bit of an edge to it but not much else. Jamie's grandpa has been dead for a month but the old codger still comes to Jamie and relates exciting tales of swashbuckling and big-game hunting, telling the young boy that he should follow his gramps into the unknown. Turns out the spook never liked Jamie's dad for marrying his daughter and wants to take the boy away from him just to make it even. The tale ends with a thud but Dominguez's art is a highlight. "The Vampire" is just another variation on "guess who the monster is" with predictable results.

"The Night Jamie..."

Jack: Let me see . . . in the Twilight Zone episode, "Long Distance Call," a boy's dead grandmother talks to him over a toy telephone and he nearly dies before his father intervenes and the grandmother lets go of her hold on the child. In Michelinie's story, a dead grandfather plays with a boy and leads him off so that his father is nearly killed. The boy chooses to save his Dad, breaking the grandfather's hold on him. I guess if David was going to "borrow" a plot, it was good that he borrowed from a classic.

Jack Sparling & Vince Colletta

Ghosts 50

"Home is Where the Grave Is!"
Story Carl Wessler
Art by John Calnan & Tex Blaisdell

"The Trapped Phantom"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by E..R Cruz

"The Most Fearful Villain of the Supernatural"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Lee Elias

Jack: Jesse Hoyle is an eleven year old orphan who is being raised by his Uncle Martin, the caretaker of a cemetery. When local boys destroy tombstones and steal flowers from the graves, Jesse calls on a trio of ghosts to chase the boys away. Living among the dead has been educational for the lad, who demonstrates to a local schoolmarm and policeman that he has learned to read and multiply just by studying the gravestones.

The ghostly trio visits Jesse and Uncle Martin in the evenings, regaling them with stories, but every morning they must return to their bodies below the ground. After this unusual childhood, Jesse grows up and is drafted at age 18 to fight in the Vietnam War. He is assigned to an ammunition depot stateside and accidentally causes a huge explosion. Thinking he survived, he goes AWOL and runs home to Uncle Jesse and the trio of ghosts. When morning comes, he finds himself pulled inexorably toward the graveyard, where he sees that he is dead and buried.

Despite John Calnan's art, which benefits slightly from Tex Blaisdell's inks, "Home is Where the Grave Is" is an interesting story. In our DC War and Horror series, we have rarely come across a story that deals with the Vietnam War. This one features a young man who appears to be against the war, though his uncle tells him he must serve his country and sends him off to fight. Jesse is so upset about being a part of a war that he thinks is unjust that he doesn't pay attention to what he's doing and causes an explosion of ammunition. It says something about the country's mood in 1976 that, even in a kid's ghost story comic, a character would express these thoughts.

Peter: I just can't get past the dreadful art in "Home is..." nor the cliched ending (you mean Jesse was dead?! -- Holy Cow!). By default, though, it's the best thing in this issue. The final tale, "The Most Fearful Villain of the Supernatural" reads like one of those really bad Leo Dorfman "truth is stranger than fiction" ditties he used to run by us in the first few years of Ghosts. Instead, it's a similarly bad Wessler script that attempts to convince us that Bram Stoker actually palled around with Count Dracula before penning the famous novel. Based on the evidence presented in this issue, I can safely say I don't believe in Ghosts!

WE DARED ENTER!

The Very Best of DC Horror 1968-1976

Over the past three years, we've dissected and discussed over 350 DC horror comics from 1968-1976 (that's over 1000 original stories!). So why stop at 1976? I had fond memories of my DC horror title collecting days in the early 70s but that nostalgia did not extend past '76 when, I remembered, the quality began to drop. The real story is that the quality began to drop a couple of years before that (right around the time of the 100-page experiment) when legendary artists like Neal Adams and Bernie Wrightson jumped ship. At some point I intend to put down my thoughts on the remainder of the DC horror titles post-1976. There was still a bit of life left in the old dog.

Published Post-1976:

73 issues of House of Mystery
62 issues of Ghosts
46 issues of Unexpected
42 issues of Secrets of Haunted House
19 issues of The Witching Hour
12 issues of House of Secrets
5 issues of the 1978  title, Doorway to Nightmare

In two weeks, we'll kick off our chronological survey of every comic book EC published; not just the horror, but the war, science fiction, humor and misc. the legendary publisher released in comic book form, month by month. We hope you'll continue to follow our rants and raves.

-Peter Enfantino & Jack Seabrook

As a wrap-up to our DC horror coverage, we thought we'd present our individual Best of DC Horror:

PETER

The House of Gargoyles (Oleck/Sparling)
(from House of Mystery #175)

Comes a Warrior (Kane/Wood)
(from House of Mystery #180)

His Name is Cain Kane (Kane/Wood)
(from House of Mystery #180)

... And in a Far Off Land (Skeates/Wrightson)
(from Witching Hour #3)

The Devil's Doorway (Oleck/Toth)
(from House of Mystery #182

Second Chance (Conway/Kane/Adams)
(from House of Secrets #85)

The Secret of the Egyptian Cat (Kanigher/Wrightson)
(from House of Mystery #186)

Nightmare (Oleck/Adams/Giordano/Orlando)
(from House of Mystery #186)

Trumpet Perilous (Uncredited/Sparling/Abel)
(from Witching Hour #9)

Hold Swiftly, Hand of Death (Conway/Toth)
(from Witching Hour #10)

Double Cross! (Skeates/Kane/Adkins)
(from Witching Hour #12)

Swamp Thing (Wein/Wrightson)
(from House of Secrets #92)

Curse of the Cat's Cradle (Uncredited/Toth)
(from House of Secrets #93)

A Girl and Her Dog! (Conway/Morrow)
(from House of Mystery #196

A Bottle of Incense... A Whiff of the Past (Conway/Weiss/Wrightson)
(from House of Secrets #94)

The Day of the Demon (Goodwin/Sekowsky/Anderson)
(from House of Mystery #198)

A Breath of Black Death (Conway/DeZuniga)
(from House of Mystery #200)

Unholy Change (Mayer/Talaoc)
(from House of Mystery #211)

They Hunt Butterflies, Don't They? (Fleisher/Alcala)
(from House of Mystery #220

The Night of the Teddy Bear (Fleisher/Carley/Alcala)
(from House of Mystery #222)

Like Father, Like Son (Oleck/Redondo)
(from House of Secrets #116)

The Specter's Last Stand (Uncredited/Rival/Cruz)
(from Ghosts #25)

Neely's Scarecrow (Michelinie/Nino)
(from Weird Mystery Tales #16)

JACK:

Since Peter did such a thorough job of selecting the best stories, I wanted to highlight what I enjoyed most in the DC Horror comics from 1968 to 1976 from a broader perspective:

*The covers: Often, the best thing about a comic is its cover. For the first few years of this run, that meant Neal Adams. Looking back over his covers only reinforces how great they were. When his covers tapered off, Nick Cardy was there to pick up the torch and run with it. For me, getting familiar with Cardy's work was the single biggest surprise of this project.

*The art inside: The next best thing about DC Horror comics was always the inside art! In the early years, we saw great work from Adams and veterans like Alex Toth, Gil Kane and Wally Wood. By the middle period, the Filipino artists had taken over. For my money, the best of that group were Alfredo Alcala, Nestor Redondo and Alex Nino, followed closely by Gerry Talaoc and Ruben Yandoc. We also saw great work by younger artists, new to the field, such as Bernie Wrightson, Bill Payne, Mike Kaluta and Tenny Henson. Toward the end, Ramona Fradon rose to prominence and Steve Ditko returned. Of course, the single page strips by Sergio Aragones were always a highlight.

*The stories: The stories were usually the weak point for DC Horror, but there were exceptions. Jack Oleck was the best writer from start to finish, though in later years the quality of his scripts declined. The best writer overall was Michael Fleisher, though he nearly always worked with Russell Carley, whose contributions are not clear. David Michelinie, Steve Skeates, Sheldon Mayer and Maxene Fabe also made important contributions.

*The hosts: Cain always seemed to be the leader, followed by bumbling, frightened Abel. Mildred, Mordred and Cynthia were uneven--sometimes funny, sometimes annoying.

*The editor: Joe Orlando's books were hands down the best, from start to finish.

*The giant-sized issues: Loved them as a kid, love them today. The 1968-1976 period saw DC experiment with the Super DC Giants, the 52 (or 48) pages for 25 cents issues, and the 100-Page Super-Spectaculars. Besides just being thrilling for being extra long, these comics exposed us to reprints from the 1940s and 1950s. In the Horror books, this was a mixed bag, but every time we got to see vintage Alex Toth or Bernard Baily it was fun.

*The Gothic stories: These represented a change of pace from the endless parade of eight page scary tales and the romance/horror stories were fun for a short time.

*Swamp Thing: Was he (it?) the most important and lasting contribution of all of the comics we read? One could make an argument that this was the case.

In the Next Rip-Roaring Issue of
Star Spangled War Stories...
The Enemy Ace Returns!
And, in Two Weeks...

Do You Dare Enter? Part Seventy-One: September/October 1976

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The DC Mystery Anthologies 1968-1976

by Peter Enfantino and
Jack Seabrook

Leo Duranona

House of Mystery 245

"A Talent for Murder!"
Story by Coram Nobis (David V. Reed)
Art by Leopoldo Duranona

"Check the J.C. Demon Catalogue Under... Death!"
Story by Bill Parante and Guy Lillian III
Art by Alex Nino

Peter: Deep in the woods outside Shakopee, Emmy Poole's son, Vernon, wants to know why his mother hoards catalogs when she never buys nothin'. One catalog, from J.C. Demon, catches Vernon's eye and he flips through its pages, revealing a sample pack of "magic seeds." Vernon dissolves the seeds in water and then hits the sack, musing how foolish magic is but how great it would be to play a joke on the rubes in town. The superstitious residents of Shakopee have always thought ol' Emmy Poole was a witch and when snow falls the next day (in July!), talk of a lynching makes the rounds. When Emmy and Vernon come into town for provisions, they are met with derision and hate. Later that day, one of the townsfolk is found dead of fright. A woman who had confronted Emmy disappears, as does her entire house!  And that's the straw that broke the camel's back. The villagers head out to Emmy's place and string up the old woman and her son. Vernon is buried with one of the seed packs and a huge creature emerges, swallowing the entire population of Shakopee.

While "Check the J.C. Demon Catalogue Under... Death" has one of the dumbest titles ever and features several well-worn plot devices (old witch on the edge of town, anyone?), I thought it was one of the best stories we've run across in a long, long time. It's full of goofy energy and, most importantly of all, packed with Alex Nino's stylish flair and creepy nuances (the jack o' lantern atop the pole for one); it's the perfect showcase for Nino's Lovecraftian visions. I loved the twists and turns Bill Parante and Guy Lillian III subject us to and their dialogue is crisp and avoids most of the "swamp witch" cliches, as when Shakopee's judge inquires as to the whereabouts of Agatha Fround, the woman who had belittled the Pooles:

Judge: Gone? Impossible! Where'd everything go?

Townie: You got me, judge. Only thing I found this morning when I came by was this mutt! Agatha was gone... house and all... disappeared.

Jack: I'm glad you followed what was going on in this story because I couldn't make heads or tails of it. I was so dazzled by Nino's art that it really didn't matter, though, except for what seemed like too many word balloons and captions getting in the way. We haven't been treated to a story by Nino in quite a while, so it's an extra special issue. I also enjoyed the first story, "A Talent for Murder!" though I thought Duranona's art seemed a bit unfinished.

Leo Duranona

House of Secrets 141

"You Can't Beat the Devil!"
Story by Bill Finger
Art by E.R. Cruz

"Exit Laughing"
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Ernie Chua and Bill Draut

Peter: House of Secrets returns after a six-month hiatus, jettisoning its one-issue experiment with the Patchwork Man and reverting back to what it does best: presenting mediocre horror stories. While the lone installment of the Patchwork Man didn't light up my life it was, at least, an attempt by the powers-that-be to stir a rancid stew. Another file story from Bill Finger (at this time two years deceased), "You Can't Beat the Devil!" is an inane "bargain with the devil" story, at least somewhat redeemed by E.R. Cruz's art. There are some nasty, misogynistic bits in here and a "twist" you can see coming a mile away, but what sinks "You Can't..." is Finger's reliance on a plot that really needed (and still needs) to be put out to pasture.

Nicely evocative of the 1950s DC mystery stories?

Worse is "Exit Laughing," wherein Matt Sawyer returns to the site of a nasty college prank he played on the timid Ernie Cass and runs into... you guessed it, Ernie Cass! Cass was dared to spend a night in a haunted house and had his entire future altered when he was confronted by an axe-wielding ghost. Sawyer confesses that it was he, Matt, who was disguised as the ghost and Cass whips out a knife and stabs the practical joker to death. A pair of police conveniently pull up (as Cass is stabbing Matt) and explain to Sawyer's weeping widow that Ernie Cass had escaped from a mental institution the day before and had been living the last twenty years babbling about ghosts. There's nothing of Ernie Chan showing through Bill Draut's awful inks but Frank Frazetta couldn't have helped a groaner like this one. My favorite sequence would have to be the climax, where we see the two cops calmly exit their patrol car as Cass butchers his tormentor!

Jack: I enjoyed "You Can't Beat the Devil!" Finger's script is fun, especially in the way Stryker banters with the demon, and Cruz's art is sharp, including a Jerry Robinson-like splash page with an outsized Stryker looming over the city. That guy lives in an apartment building with an array of nasty folks! As for "Exit Laughing," I got a kick out of it! It's funny that House of Secrets makes its big return with 1) a deal with the devil story and 2) a spend the night in a haunted house story! I did not see the end of "Exit Laughing" coming, but then I'm not as old and wise as you are. Plus, I love any story involving an escapee from an asylum.

Ernie Chua

The Witching Hour 65

"A Handy Way to Die"
Story by Jack Phillips (George Kashdan)
Art by E.R. Cruz

"The Loathsome Loner"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Ricardo Villamonte

"Laugh? I Thought You'd Die..."
Story Uncredited
Art Uncredited

Jack: Rolf, "The Loathsome Loner," mugs a beautiful girl named Elise Vaughn in an alley late one night but lets her keep her money when he discovers that she's blind. His subsequent crimes against other poor victims result in a change in his physical appearance so that he resembles a gruesome hunchback. The only good he does is to give some of his ill gotten gains to the pretty blind girl. She uses the money to have her blindness cured but, to Rolf's dismay, once she can see she agrees to marry Charlie, who is either a policeman, a security guard, or a doorman, judging from his outfit. As luck would have it, Charlie turns out to be a cop, and Rolf turns himself in without confessing to Elise that he's her sugar daddy. To top it off, once he's in prison, his good looks return! Shades of Charlie Chaplin! Leave it to Carl Wessler to rip off the classic City Lights, mix in some Jekyll and Hyde, and bake a loaf of confusion--all in a tidy five pages!

Peter: The opener, "A Handy Way to Die," by Jack Phillips, serves up the usual tasty art by E.R. Cruz but  disappoints with its inane script. We're introduced to Frank Crosley, a lucky guy who survives a tenement fire and, as one would do, visits a fortune teller to find the reason for his good luck. The old crone tells Frank he's got a blessed "time line" across his palm and that will enable him to live to be a "hunnerd." As most people would do, Frank takes this news at face value and plans a daring money-making scheme. He kidnaps a mobster for a perceived big ransom but the plan goes awry and the cops show up at his bell tower hideout. When Frank slides down the bell's rope, he burns through his time line and falls to his death. We're continually told Frank is a loathsome, nasty dude but, until the very climax, we're not shown any evidence of such. He's just a poor guy who lived through a blazing fire. We do know he's not that bright though since all it takes is a word from a swami and Frank's convinced he's invincible.

Luis Dominguez

Unexpected 175

"The Haunted Mountain"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by E.R. Cruz

"Long Arm of Lunacy"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by Buddy Gernale

"Mad Hacker of Kingston Row"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Teny Henson

Jack: Little Hans fell to his death from a mountain, so the villagers think it must be the work of Countess Freida Von Koerner, who admits she inherited a witching curse but claims she never used it for evil and certainly never harmed the child. Villagers being villagers, they drag her partway up the mountain and toss her into the boiling sulphur spring, but she does not die. Instead, she becomes a skeleton with raggedy clothes and blond hair, informing her tormentors that she will haunt them forever. In the days that follow, the mountain is covered in swirling mist that soon parts to reveal that the countess has used her witchcraft to carve a giant skull in the side of what is now "The Haunted Mountain." Unable to blow it up with dynamite, the villagers catch the countess alone on the mountain and try to kill her. She falls off and a lantern she carries ignites an underground gas pocket, blowing mountain, villagers and village to bits.

I really enjoyed "The Haunted Mountain" up to the end, which was a bit of a disappointment. I certainly liked seeing the countess come out of the boiling sulphur spring as a skeleton, and E.R. Cruz does a terrific job portraying her and the skull face on the side of the mountain.

Peter: Since "Long Arm of Lunacy" and "Mad Hacker of Kingston Row" are so gawdawful, "Haunted Mountain" wins Best Story this issue by default but it's by no means a good story. Nice, atmospheric art by Cruz is the only saving grace this time out. Well, that and the dynamic cover by Dominguez, which gets my vote for Best Cover of the Year.

Ernie Chua

House of Mystery 246

"Death-Vault of the Eskimo Kings"
Story by Michael Fleisher and Russell Carley
Art by Mike Vosburg and Sal Trapani

"Tomb It May Concern"
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Jess Jodloman

Peter: Two Arctic explorers stumble upon the mythical "Death-Vault of the Eskimo Kings" and the vast treasures uncovered in the cavern turn the men against each other. Boring art and cliched characters. Stop me if you've heard this one before. Slightly better (in the slightest sense) is "Tomb It May Concern," about Chester Foyle, a bed-ridden and money-bagged old sleaze who needs to rid himself of his wife before curvaceous young nurse Peggy will marry him. Chester may be old but he isn't blind; he knows Peggy only wants his money but there are a couple things Peggy's got that he wants (way up firm and high, as Bob Seger would say) and money means nothing to a feeble old codger. Chester lays the groundwork of an alibi by letting on he's fearful of burglars and, one night, he heads for his wife's room with a long, sharp knife. He never gets there though as he's clobbered from behind with a hammer. Next thing he knows he lying on a slab in the morgue. Has Chester Foyle really shuffled off or is he in some kind of death-like paralysis? Though the outcome is disappointing, at least Jack Oleck didn't stray down the path I feared he was heading with the subtle hints of the classic Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode, "Breakdown," dropped in the opening panels. We discover, in the end, that the hammer-wielder was nurse Peggy, but did the curvaceous caretaker whomp the old perve by accident or...? That's left to the imagination. Jodloman's art is just the right kind of sleazy for the subject matter but, at times, the word balloons threaten to blanket the visuals. Not a great story but for this issue it's about as good as it's going to get.

Jack: You're right to call Jodloman's art the right kind of sleazy. His nurse reminded me of one of Robert Crumb's women. It's too bad Fleisher's stories took such a nose dive. A few years earlier and the idea of an issue of House of Mystery with stories by him and Oleck would have had me looking for a classic. Instead, the DC Horror line has about dried up by this point.

Ernie Chua

Ghosts 49

"The Ghost in the Cellar"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Lee Elias

"The Dead Came Calling"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Pit Capili

"The Haunted Hoard of Gold"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Fred Carrillo

Jack: On a Caribbean island vacation, Chick Cahill and Georgie August encounter a cantankerous old man fishing from a dock. Chick pushes him into the water but Georgie saves him from drowning, so the old man relates the story of hidden pirate treasure and hands Georgie a map. Chick bashes the old man's skull in and then pushes Chick off a precipice to his death. When Chick finds the treasure, he is confronted by the ghosts of a pirate, the old man and Chick, though he thinks the latter two are still alive. Chick spins a tale about sharing the loot and the old man lets him go, but when Chick finds "The Haunted Hoard of Gold" he ends up buried alive in sand and drowned in water.

Chick is not very bright.

It was not easy to decide which of the three stories in this issue to write about, since all three are by Carl Wessler, all three have weak art, and all three are mediocre. I chose the final tale because Chick is such a jerk and the ending is so ridiculous. Why does he suddenly get buried in sand and then drowned? Wessler provides no explanation. It just happens.

Peter: "The Ghost in the Cellar" is about as juvenile a story as we've encountered on our long and arduous journey, Jack. From Lee Elias's seemingly unfinished art (stick figures might have produced better results) to Wessler's typically overblown captions and dialogue (They waited with bated breath for long, endless minutes... an eternity. Tension and terror took their toll... As they trod down the stairs, fear lashed them to the depths... gripping them with the shuddering dread of the unknown...), "The Ghost in the Cellar" is a sad commentary on just how far the DC horror line had slipped by 1976. Elias's idea of a terrifying specter is along the lines of the cheap sfx creature from Outer Limits' "Behold, Eck!"

Holy Bronze Star!

Can Sgt. Rock and the French kid escape?

Tune in on February 15th!

Same Easy time!

Same Easy channel!

Do You Dare Enter? Part Seventy: July/August 1976

The DC Mystery Anthologies 1968-1976

by Peter Enfantino and
Jack Seabrook

Ricardo Villagran

The House of Mystery 243

"Brother Bear"
Story by Bob Haney
Art by Franc C. Reyes

"Things Like That Don't Happen"
Story by Sheldon Mayer
Art by Jess Jodloman

Peter: Hunter/tycoon Zebulon Hunt is sentenced to die by electric chair but... for what crime? In a flashback we see that Hunt has a penchant for polar bears and their skins; in fact, he's dressed his entire mansion with pelts and heads. His manservant, Umiak, tells Zeb that he should not be hunting polar bears anymore as it will bring bad juju but the tyrant won't listen. When Zeb jumps in and nails a bear that Umiak was hunting (in an admirable fashion), the gods are disturbed and a price must be paid. Umiak disappears but that doesn't keep the great hunter from his fun and, while out on the frozen tundra, the biggest polar bear ever to cross Zebulon's path practically gives itself up to him. Zeb takes advantage of the free pass and then lops off the head and walks it down to the taxidermist. That's where the trouble starts. Though "Brother Bear" is a variation on a theme we've seen before (several times in a jungle setting with Alfredo Alcala art), Bob Haney (whose work we've been critiquing in our DC War room) manages to pull this one off. I especially liked the fact that, when the payoff comes, Umiak's noggin is never seen, only gasped at, a subtlety we don't see often in these here parts.

Jack: I preferred the second story, "Things Like That Don't Happen," in which a Boardwalk Gypsy King fortune teller machine gets revenge by murdering the no good husband of a decent woman. Jess Jodloman's art is always a bit on the scratchy side but I've gotten used to it, and any story that involves a Boardwalk fortune telling machine already has a leg up in my book. Millie, the gal who is killed, shows admirable skill when she picks the lock on the machine to prop up the Gypsy King after he suddenly falls over.

Something sexual about this panel!

Luis Dominguez

The Witching Hour 64

"The Mark of a Murderer"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by E.R. Cruz

"Mirror of Madness"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by Buddy Gernale

"My Mother Was a Witch!"
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by John Calnan

Jack: Poor Julie Burrows! After her father walked out on her and her mother when she was just eight years old, the other kids at school started to pick on her. Good thing she could say that "My Mother Was a Witch!" Mom waves her hand and the bullies regret their behavior. The same fate awaits teachers and parents who don't mind their manners. Two years later, Julie's Mom dies and the girl is sent to an orphanage, where she retaliates against the cruel matron with a little witchcraft of her own. Finally, Dad comes to retrieve her, revealing that he's a warlock and little Julie takes after her old man--Mom was never a witch after all! Wessler and Calnan combine to create a story that barely edges out the other two travesties in this, another forgettable issue of The Witching Hour.

Peter: Wessler and Calnan combine to create a story certain to top my "Worst of the Year" list. Wessler's script is inane but Calnan's amateurish chicken scratches seal the deal. Just plain ugly. Nothing about this story made sense. Julie's dad is sent away by her mom because her mother didn't want anyone to know he was a warlock? Why wouldn't she let dad hang around and help Julie master her skills? Wouldn't that make more sense? None of the stories this issue have a twist ending. They just end. If there's one speck of respectability here, it lies in the artwork E.R. Cruz delivers for "The Mark of a Murderer." Nicely atmospheric. Otherwise, it's the usual issue of The Wretched Hour.

Luis Dominguez

Unexpected 174

"Gauntlet of Fear"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by Don Perlin

"Sands of Time"
Story by uncredited
Art by Rich Buckler

"The Long Arms of Death"
Story by Weshley Marsh (Murray Boltinoff)
Art by Fred Carrillo

Jack: Gerald left England to become secretary to a wealthy man in India, but all he can think about is the man's pretty but lonely daughter, Kaleli. Ignoring the father's warnings to stay away from his daughter, Gerald turns on the charm and before you know it he tells Pop he wants to marry the gal. Oddly enough, she never wants to go for a swim, or dance, or basically do anything involving removing her shawl. Gerald tells Kaleli he bought airline tickets for the both of them and, when he robs her Dad's safe, he is surprised by his employer, who tells him to keep the cash but leave the girl alone. Gerald kills the boss and is attacked by his bodyguards, but soon Kaleli grabs them and Gerald sees that she is Kali, the ten-armed goddess. She does not cotton to his suggestion that they go to London and have eight of her arms removed by a surgeon, so she gives him a great big ten-armed hug and crushes him to death.

"The Long Arms of Death" is easily the most fun story in this issue of Unexpected, which also features a dreadful entry by Kashdan and Perlin and a two-page flop by Rich Buckler.

How many arms does
she have on the cover?

Peter: With the cover illustration and a "stunning beauty" named Kaleli, I sure never saw that shock ending coming! But I thought the highlight of the issue was the delightfully dumb "Gauntlet of Fear," in which psychiatrist Dr. Terrell is hired by the President of a "remote tiny republic" to help soothe his fears of assassination. The doc is kidnapped by The Great Bajir, an evil and rotund terrorist whose goal is to brainwash the headshrinker into murdering the President. Bajir's personal fear of dirt (!) becomes his undoing in the end. "Gauntlet" has a script that's one part Man From U.N.C.L.E. and six parts dopiness and art by one of the crown princes of mediocrity that suits its inanity. Hell, at least it's a lot more fun than 90% of the swill that's being presented as professional comic book material this month.

Luis Dominguez

The House of Mystery 244

"Kronos--Zagros--Eborak!"
Story by George Kashdan
Art by Frank Thorne

"Your Epitaph is Only a Birthday Card"
Story by Doug Moench
Art by Frank Reyes

Peter: Doug Moench gives us a little bit of the deep preaching he became famous for over at Marvel with "Your Epitaph..." Two men discuss reincarnation and the afterlife in a hospital waiting room while, unbeknownst to them, a barbarian's soul drifts through space, waiting to be reborn. In the end, one man's friend dies a peaceful death and the other becomes a father (to a very young barbarian, no doubt). The reason why Moench's near-sermon about how to live life works here whereas it never worked in, say, his awful contributions to the Frankenstein series in Monsters Unleashed, is that, by 1976, the writer had honed his skills. Sure, there's a bit of the pretentiousness found in his Marvel work but, seemingly, Moench had finally learned to rein in not only his purple prose but also his firm belief that the world was going to hell in a bucket and everyone was out to get the young man. I'm more open to listening to the message if I don't think the messenger is full of shit. The issue's opener, "Kronos--Zagros--Eborak," about a lawyer in the Public Defender's office who's assigned to investigate a satanic worship ring, sports nice visuals from newcomer Frank Thorne (whose work on Red Sonja is being discussed, as we speak, over at Marvel University) and a clever twist in the tale. Overall, a decent issue of House of Mystery.

Jack: I liked the Frank Thorne story and I, too, was surprised by the twist ending. The only laugh out loud moment for me was the disguise worn by the lawyer when he goes to investigate the satanic cult--he looks like Huggy Bear from Starsky and Hutch! The Moench story seemed preachy and obvious to me, and the art made me long for the good old days when Gil Kane drew the sword and sorcery stories for the DC horror line.

Lawyer in
disguise

Huggy Bear

Luis Dominguez

Ghosts 48

"Showdown with a Specter"
Story Uncredited
Art by Tenny Henson

"The Phantom Head"
Story Uncredited
Art by Buddy Gernale

"The Girl Who Inherited a Ghost"
Story Uncredited
Art by Gene Ureta

Jack: In the summer of '68, Villem Kruger takes his wife and little boy to a remote part of South Africa, where he explores the rubble that remains of his late grandfather's diamond mine. Little does he know that he's about to have a "Showdown with a Specter!" The ghost is that of a laborer who died when the mine caved in, and he vows revenge on Villem, the grandson of the cruel mine owner. That night, Villem's son Jan disappears, and Villem follows him into the mine, where he is confronted by the specter. The boy volunteers to sacrifice himself in place of his father, but the ghost reveals that the boy is adopted and thus not a blood relative to the mine owner of long ago. Impressed by the boy's courage and by the father's willingness to adopt a child, the ghost decides to let bygones be bygones and heads off to his final rest.

This is one of several stores we've seen that are drawn by Tenny Henson, and it looks like the work of a young artist with a lot of promise. At this stage in his career, Henson's strength seems to be in portraying beautiful blondes! I liked this story a lot, especially the ending where the ghost changed his mind and respected the kindness and self-sacrifice of Villem and his son. This was my favorite story of this two-month period.

One other comment--I think "Gene Ureta," who signed the last story in this issue, must be a pseudonym. The art is very strong and has echoes of Gene Colan as well as some panels that look like Neal Adams stopped by to ink them. "Gene Ureta" has no other credits anywhere. Ever.

Peter: Other than the decent art of Tenny Henson, there's not a lot to get excited by in this issue of Ghosts. "The Phantom Head" is another of those stories I would imagine was scribed by the most prolific of Ghosts' writers, Leo Dorfman. I can imagine Dorfman, sitting in his office, opening Encyclopedia Britannica volumes with his eyes closed, and pointing his finger at some random subject. In this case, Leo's finger stopped on Michelangelo.

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