EC Comics! It's An Entertaining Comic! Issue 72

The EC Reign Month by Month 1950-1956
72: January 1956
+ The Best of 1955

Wood

Incredible Science Fiction 33
"Big Moment" ★★
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Wally Wood

"Kaleidoscope" ★★★
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Jack Davis

"One Way Hero" ★★★
Story by Jack Oleck
Art by Bernie Krigstein

"Judgment Day!"
Story by Al Feldstein
Art by Joe Orlando
(Reprinted from Weird Fantasy #18, April 1953)

"An Eye for an Eye" ★★1/2
Story by Jack Oleck?
Art by Angelo Torres

The incredible shrinking men.

A meteor shower mutates all animal life on Earth and leaves men cowering before giant lizards, cats, ant-eaters, fish, and other previously innocuous forms of life. Man becomes the hunted. Generations later, Andrew leads a group of men back to a fabled city named N'Ork where, legend has it, civilization stored all of its weapons after making war illegal. Though the group incurs heavy losses, Andrew finally reaches the pot at the end of the rainbow, only to have his hopes dashed. Evidently, the one detail left out of all the stories of the apocalypse is the fact that it was man who was mutated. Weapons of this size are useless to tiny men. I had a feeling this was the climax we were heading for (the mushrooms on page one were the tip-off), but I kinda wish Jack had gotten us there a little quicker. The reveal is made in a rare 2/3 of a page panel, all the better to show us the really big guns.

"Kaleidoscope"

Venus has conquered Earth but they haven't bent our will. Now, Earthlings work as slaves under Venusian guard, but Andy Davis has a plan. He's found a rocket ship parked in a remote field and he enlists the aid of several friends in an attempt to get the rocket usable again. Andy's plan is to have his friend, Larson, work his magic and create an impenetrable shield around the ship, all the better to blast the Venusian scum to hell! It takes years (and the lives of all of Andy's friends) but, finally, the ship is ready for battle and Andy does his race proud by destroying all the Venusian war ships and making Earth habitable again. Just as Andy is enjoying his moment of victory, his wife calls to him and scolds him for playing in the old hunk-of-junk rocket ship and reminds him that if the guards see him, he'll be in big trouble. I liked "Kaleidoscope" (the title alludes to the gizmo that Andy stares into on board the ship) quite a bit, mostly due to its lead character and its downbeat (while at the same time upbeat) climax. It's hard to pull off a reveal like that without making it maudlin but Oleck succeeds nicely.

"One Way Hero"

In a Martian bar, Mart Sawyer recognizes his little brother, Johnny, but Johnny doesn't recognize him. Through a series of flashbacks, we learn that Johnny is a "One Way Hero," a spaceman who lost his nerve and was dumped on Mars, never to return to Earth. The shame has caused Johnny to lose a bit of his memory and most of his self-respect, but Mart reminds him that there are plenty of great jobs and hot women on Mars (and a McDonald's coming next month) and there's no shame in becoming one of the new colonists. Mart tells his brother goodbye, he'll have to be leaving, and heads back to the rocket port, where he loads spaceships and performs other jobs. He, like his brother, is a "One Way Hero." Though the ending is way too predictable, "One Way Hero" has the same charm as "Kaleidoscope," in that it introduces kind-hearted and well-meaning protagonists crushed by turns of fate and yet still going on the best they can. Particularly grueling is the scene where we witness Johnny's meltdown on board the rocket ship.

For our very last helping of EC science-fiction, we have an oddity. Originally pulled due to complaints from the (don't get me started) CCA, "An Eye for an Eye" was replaced with a reprinting of the equally-controversial "Judgment Day!" "Eye" sat mouldering in Bill Gaines's vault until it finally saw print in the Horror Comics of the 1950s collection in 1971. When it came time for ISF #33 to be reprinted by Gemstone in 1995, a "Judgment" was made and "An Eye for an Eye" was reprinted instead. Why the CCA would object to something that's as harmless as an Osmonds back-stage pass, I have no idea, but no one ever accused the Comics Code of being rational. Angelo Torres, doing his best Frazetta/Williamson/Krenkel impersonation, illustrates the story of a post-apocalyptic world where mutants run in tribes and one "normal" man and his mate search for a safe place to make their home. The woman is killed by a band of giant Praying Mantises and the man is left to fend on his own. He finds what he considers safe ground but is killed by a tribe of gill-men. As he lays dying in the mud, we see he has a third eye in the back of his neck.

Though, by now, I've had just about enough of the "post-apocalyptic" landscape and its mutant warriors (and will continue to be extremely tired of them when DC uses the trope, ad nauseam, a decade later), "An Eye for an Eye" has some great art and a legitimately surprising final panel. The last couple months of their existence, EC began running a scattershot column in some of their zines called "The Entertainment Box," a mostly-disposable "review" feature that gossiped about new movies and records (one of the columns extolled the virtues of Frank Sinatra's latest LPs!). The column that appeared in ISF #33 made public The Complete EC Checklist by Fred Von Bernewitz, a "pamphlet" that compiled information on story titles and artists from the various EC books. A lousy quarter would buy you the Checklist plus a yearly supplement! Von Bernewitz would publish several small-print runs of the Checklist and then go deluxe with Tales of Terror in 2000. Where has fandom gone? -Peter

Jack-I'll tell you where fandom has gone--right here on the blogs! These are the fanzines of today, just free of charge and delivered immediately. I was looking forward to the last issue of Incredible Science Fiction but I was utterly disappointed. "Big Moment" is a very weak tale with art by Wally Wood that looks rushed. "Kaleidoscope" also looks like a rush job by Jack Davis and I thought it had almost no story at all. "One Way Hero" is just plain dull, but at least Krigstein's art usually looks kind of sloppy and hurried, so it's not a surprise. "An Eye for an Eye" has the best art in the issue but the story is as disappointing as the rest. This issue just seems tired to me, like it was time to be done with the EC experiment.

Craig

MD 5

"Complete Cure" ★
Story Uncredited
Art by Reed Crandall

"Child's Play" ★
Story Uncredited
Art by Joe Orlando

"Emergency" ★★1/2
Story Uncredited
Art by Graham Ingels

"The Right Diagnosis" ★1/2
Story Uncredited
Art by George Evans

"Complete Cure"

Philip Stuart is involved in nasty accident and both his legs are crushed. Though his wife, Anne, is hesitant, she finally consents to a double amputation. Once he awakens, Phil becomes moody and self-pitying, believing himself to be half a man and worthless, but his surgeon, Dr. Fields, refuses to give up on his patient. Phil begins rehab with his prosthetic legs but it's a slow go and his self-confidence reaches an all-time low. One night, Fields calls Phil and asks him to meet him down at his gym, where he introduces Phil to one of his colleagues, Dr. Parks. Phil is polite but sees no reasoning behind the meeting until Parks drops his drawers and... yep, shows off his prosthetic legs. "Normandy, on D-Day," says Parks, and suddenly the light bulb comes on over Phil's eyes. He swears he'll become a doctor and save lives just as Fields saved his.

From simpering wimp to doctor-in-training in one page

Oh brother. Not only is "Complete Cure" tedious, but it's boring and steals the riff from a story published just last issue ("So Others May Walk"). We can only sit and gape in wonder at how stupid Phil acts for six pages, whining and carrying on, ignoring the fact that he's got a babe wife who doesn't mind that he stays home all day and watches Ozzie and Harriet and cooks really bad, but then has a complete turnabout when he sees a doctor with artificial legs! I'm not asking for masterpieces but is it too much to ask for Carl or Jack (or whoever wrote this) to stray from the same formula they were using on City Hospital? And, I have to say, these poor doctors that populate the pages of MD don't seem to be paid very well since they're always wearing the same suits, day in and day out. Gone are the headers at the top of the splash announcing what each story's malady will be. I assume that's to keep the suspense (!).

"Child's Play"

Little Jimmy is going deaf and all the kids think he's stuck up, so Mom feels if he gets the hearing aid his doctor prescribes it just means the other kids will get even nastier to her baby. Dr. Kenyon insists and, eventually, Jimmy's Dad talks Mom into knuckling under and putting the kid under the knife. Jimmy's operation goes swimmingly but Ma is paranoid the neighborhood bullies will spread rumors that Jimmy is pretentious and a freak, so she shuts him in the house for days on end, only leaving him long enough to shop at Macy's every day and have the occasional tea with the girls. One day, Mom comes home to find the house empty. She drops her bags and races out, finding Jimmy at the kids' club house. All the kids are trying out his hearing aid, remarking that Jimmy might still be a pretentious freak, but he sure has a cool toy hooked up to his ear.

Revenge of the Nerds, circa 1956

Sure, once again, an MD story sucks the life from its reader. "Child's Play" is sentimental and as syrupy as that stack of pancakes you're finishing, but it's the visuals that command comment this time out. This could be the worst art ever to appear in an EC comic. I thought, by story's end, we would discover that Jimmy wasn't deaf but, actually, an alien child. Characters are posed in the strangest fashion (Dr. Kenyon is speaking to the family but appears to be looking off at God knows what), Orlando's choice of photo reference is suspect at the very least (Jimmy's Pop looks as though he wants to make love to Mom rather than use the belt on Jimmy), and the whole enchilada has a bland, lifeless look to it. The final panel, of Jimmy and two of his bullying buddies, looks like Joe Orlando stumbled onto Photoshop thirty years before it was invented!

"And the coffee machine isn't giving change..."

We've got one heck of an "Emergency" here! A vicious storm has knocked the power out at a remote hospital but super doctors, Gresham and Halleck, remind their nurses and staff that, seventy-five years before, medicine was performed in the dark. Through a modern miracle of humanity, every single patient is rescued (even the "Contagion" ward patient who lives on a ventilator and must have her lungs worked by hand) and the next morning finds the two exhausted physicians asleep on the waiting room couch. I couldn't help but be swept along by the pinball-like events of "Emergency," with each hallway turn bringing some worse medical mishap to Drs. G+H ("What? The X-Ray machine is down?"). The script is involving (something missing from the previous stories this issue) and humorous at times. Once the sun comes out, the rescue workers finally break through washed-out roads and downed power lines to face an exhausted Dr. G. "How's everything?," asks their leader. Gresham, with cigarette hanging from his mouth, answers "Fine... now! Just fine!" You can take that several ways but I like to think the retort is delivered with spit and sarcasm.

"The Right Diagnosis"

George Gordon has a pain in the stomach but he's become something of a pain in the ass to his doc. As George's family physician for years, Dr. Jerris is only all too familiar with George's hypochondria, so when his patient shows up at the office demanding an appendectomy, Jerris brushes George off and tells him "The Right Diagnosis" is that he's merely depressed. George storms out of the office, promising he'll get that operation if he has to do it himself. Days later, worried that the numbskull will visit a doctor who's not as careful as he, Jerris visits George's home, only to be told that George has checked into an unknown hospital. The doc spends hours on the phone, finally identifying the hospital, and then heads over, where he finds George on a high ledge, despondent after having been given the same diagnosis. Jerris talks George off the ledge and the two have a laugh over how things escalated.

Since when?

Just once. Just once I'd like to see a downer of an ending from an MD story. I know sometimes, in real life, there are unhappy endings to medical treatments but you'd never know it from this title, which ends its insignificant run after only five issues and twenty stories. "The Right Diagnosis" reads as though it's a cross-over between MD and Psychoanalysis (oh lord, the thought of that!) in that Dr. Jerris has to deal with a nut job rather than real medicine. We all know that it was the CCA that killed the New Direction titles (Gaines was sick and tired of buckling to their every demand) but I wonder how long MD, Psychoanalysis, and Extra (the weakest of the new titles) would have lasted had EC merely gone along with the constraints and continued to pump out this weak crap post-January 1956. -Peter

Jack: Maybe my mood at the time I read them has something to do with how much or how little I enjoy these comics, but I thought this one was very good. Reed Crandall demonstrates in "Complete Cure" that he can do anything and is still producing terrific art; the story itself is fairly interesting. I don't like Joe Orlando's EC work much, either, but "Child's Play" got to me and I thought the moment when the boy could finally hear was moving. I also liked the happy ending and thought the good writing made the art bearable. The doctor in "Emergency" is the kind of doctor I want, and the story was thrilling from start to finish, with very nice art by Ghastly. Evans's work on "The Right Diagnosis" seemed rushed, but there was a brief moment of excitement out on the ledge at the end. I thought this last issue of MD was much more enjoyable than the last issue of Incredible Science Fiction.

Davis

Panic 12

"Charlie Chinless"★★
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Bill Elder

"House Hunting!"★★
Story by Al Feldstein
Art by Jack Davis

"The Heartaches of Joliet's Groans!"★★
Story by Nick Meglin and Al Feldstein
Art by Bill Elder

"'S a Tragic Air Command"★★
Story by Al Feldstein
Art by Wally Wood

Famous detective "Charlie Chinless" investigates the death of a sideshow midget who fell off of a sideshow giant at the circus. Charlie unmasks the dog-faced girl (who is really a spaniel) and the beautiful singer (who is really Number One Son) before the fortune teller reveals--with his dying breath--that the killer is the strong man. No, wait! It's the circus manager! A lion eats him.

"House Hunting!"

Ignore the racist "comedy" and chalk it up to the era; the opening story in the last issue of Panic is about as funny as every other story we've read so far by Jack Mendelsohn, and that means not at all.

John Q. Public and family have a hilarious time "House Hunting!" All sorts of mishaps befall them, and when they finally find the perfect house they realize they already own it. Like Will Elder in the first story, Jack Davis does a competent job, but reading stories like this is just a matter of turning pages and hoping the end will come soon.

Pretty Joliet lives with her sister Eva and their Pop. For some reason, these gorgeous gals can't seem to land husbands, and therein lies the tale of "The Heartaches of Joliet's Groans!" After a series of unsuccessful romances, Eva escapes into the comic strip below and finds love.

"The Heartaches..."

Will Elder could draw just about anything and beautiful girls are no exception. However, when the subject being parodied is as obscure as this one, it's hard to work up any laughs.

Gee, aren't those new wide-screen movies something? For instance, "'S a Tragic Air Command," where Melvin "Ditch" Digger, a baseball player, returns to the Air Force and finds that the planes have gotten a whole lot bigger and faster than they were in WWII. After a thrilling bombing run, he's reunited with his wife. The end.

Like Will Elder and Jack Davis, Wally Wood gives this story his all but the material is so weak that it's just an exercise in patience. That pretty much sums up most of the twelve-issue run of Panic, a comic that should be left on the dust heap of history.-Jack

"Charlie Chinless"

Peter: Yes, "Charlie Chinless" is mindless gunk (like the rest of the contents of Panic over the years) but it's sprinkled with some undeniably funny Chinless proverbs/one-liners guaranteed to raise a smile or two ("When there is beautiful tie between father and son... is usually worn by son!"), but we're far-removed from the laugh-out-loud parodies in MAD. After a respite from laughter (I think I slept through the absolutely horrid "House Hunting!"), my snickering continued again, all through "The Heartaches of Joliet's Groans!," a strip I was prepared to hate and found immensely entertaining. Meglin and Feldstein borrow a can't-miss gimmick from Harvey, the "fourth-wall breaker," when Eva uses an axe to chop her way into the lower newspaper strip. The one-liners are a hoot as well. What is going on here? I'm actually enjoying an issue of Panic! Then "'S a Tragic Air Command" brings me back to Earth. After an amusing prologue, explaining different techniques of film projecting, we're stuck with yet another unfunny film parody. The good news is "The Heartaches..." but the better news is that Panic #12 is the final issue!

THE BEST OF 1955

Peter

  1 "Master Race" (Impact #1)
  2 "In the Bag" (Shock SuspenStories #18)
  3 "Kismet" (Piracy #2)
  4 "The Know-Nothing" (Valor #4)
  5 "Rip-Up's Believe It Or Don't" (MAD #23)
  6 "The Skipper" (Piracy #6)
  7 "The New C.O." (Aces High #1)
  8 "Mickey Rodent" (MAD #19)
  9 "Chivalry" (Aces High #2)
10 "The Champion" (Valor #2)


Jack

  1 "Blind Alleys" (Tales from the Crypt 46)
  2 "Adaptability" (Weird Science-Fantasy 27)
  3 "Poopeye!" (Mad 21)
  4 "Just Her Speed" (Crime SuspenStories 27)
  5 "Master Race"
  6 "Gopo Gossum!" (Mad 23)
  7  "Dateline: New York City" (Extra 2)
  8 "The Champion"
  9 "The Rules" (Aces High 3)
10 "Debt of Honor" (Valor 3)

What's more insane...
Killing Da Vinci
or assigning art chores to Frank Robbins?
The boys will answer that question next week!

And in three weeks...
We'll put a capper on our coverage of the EC line
with a three-part look at the Pictos, 
Best of All Time, and lots of surprises!

EC Comics! It's An Entertaining Comic! Issue 70

The EC Reign Month by Month 1950-1956
70: November 1955

Evans

Piracy 7

"Partners"★★
Story Uncredited
Art by Reed Crandall

"Up the River"★★1/2
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Bernie Krigstein

"John's Reward"★★1/2
Story Uncredited
Art by Graham Ingels

"Temptation"★★★
Story Uncredited
Art by George Evans

"Partners"

Tired of fighting all the time, pirate captains Valez and Kemp decide to join forces, though each knows the other intends to break the deal at the first opportunity. One night aboard ship, after amassing quite a fortune in stolen loot, the captains plan each other's doom, but Kemp gets the better of Valez and sends him and a couple of his men off in a rowboat. Months later, Valez and his men run into Kemp's mate and threaten him; the mate says he wants to join them and shows them a spot on an island where Kemp supposedly buried his fortune. Valez and his men dig for two months and only find treasure chests with the bones of their former colleagues. Kemp stands at the top of the hole and starts to have his men bury his rival, but Valez has his own men knock out the support beams holding up the sides of the hole, causing Kemp and his men to fall in and join Valez and his men in the grave.

Despite Reed Crandall's fine work, I did not think much of "Partners." The cliche of the fighting captains pretending to join forces was not very well handled and that hole they dig over the course of two months is ridiculously large. I would think such a shrewd pirate captain as Valez would realize he'd been tricked long before digging down sixty feet. Sixty feet! Think of it.

"Up the River"

In the late summer of 1777, the British troops at Saratoga are in desperate need of reinforcements but ships far down river cannot get up the Hudson to them because the colonists have stretched chains across the water. An American spy who is nearly captured escapes but leaves behind a map that gives the British admiral an idea--why not sail up a parallel waterway and surprise the troops? He tries to do this but his ship runs aground in the shallow Bronx River and he is captured by a ragtag band of Americans in canoes!

Bernie Krigstein is not in experimental mode in "Up the River," so the art is fairly run of the mill, but Wessler's script is fun and the little history lesson is appreciated. It's always nice to see the underdog trick the man in power! It really stretches a point to call this a pirate story, though.

"John's Reward"

John Tabori is an honest fisherman whose wife constantly berates him for not making enough money. He needs one big catch to keep from losing his boat and one night he gets it--more fish than he could ever have dreamed of. He then sees a vessel sinking nearby and chooses to jettison his valuable catch in order to save the people aboard the liner from drowning. He returns home and loses his boat but is happy. What is "John's Reward"? His wife left him!

I let out a guffaw at the end of this one which, admittedly, has nothing whatsoever to do with pirates. Ingels's art is nothing special and I was expecting someone that John rescued to turn out to be rich, but instead he lost everything and the twist was that he finally lost his wife as well and was delighted. Very clever and unexpected.

"Temptation"

Captain Dover, skipper of the Mimosa, is not happy when Chief Mate Childers bursts into his cabin and sees that the ship is secretly transporting $2,000,000 in gold and gems. Worried that the "Temptation" to steal the fortune might be too great, Dover keeps an eye on Childers through the succeeding voyage, which is married by a series of unfortunate accidents. Finally, the ship crashes and Dover orders everyone to abandon ship; Childers wants to stay and save the treasure so he has to be knocked out. A month later, Childers asks Dover if they can salvage the ship and collect the treasure, since insurance has already paid for the loss. Dover declines but Childers finds a backer and goes through with the salvage operation. He returns to Dover a week later with a startling revelation: the treasure is gone! Childers tells Dover that he knows the captain hid the money and then sank the ship on purpose; Dover tries to make a deal but an insurance man hiding nearby has heard all he needs to hear.

The last issue of Piracy goes out on a high note with this tale illustrated by the wonderful George Evans. Once again, I fell for the misdirection and thought Childers was a crook; I also fell for the cover, which suggests a scene from this story that never happened!-Jack

Exactly the way Enfantino-Seabrook
Blogging Inc. began!

Peter: I'm being completely sincere when I say I'm going to miss the hell out of Piracy. It could be that it died at just the right time, but we don't have the proof that eventually the quality would tail off. Call me crazy but I firmly believe that Wessler, Oleck, Evans, Krigstein, Crandall, and company all reveled in the freedom this book gave them. Sure, they had to involve the sea somehow but quite a few of its 28 tales push the boundaries of the word piracy. The final issue is just as good as the previous six, with the high point, for me, being "Partners," a darkly humorous bit of swashbuckling. The dialogue between Kemp and Valez crackles (a lot of it sounded like the e-mails Jack and I send back and forth) and all the twists and turns left a wide grin on my face. Most husbands in the 1950s shook their heads after reading "John's Reward" and thought, "If only it was that easy!" "Up the River" was a bit too historical for my tastes but "Temptation" unfurled a fabulous twist in its tail I never saw coming.

Panic 11

"Mary Worthless!" ★★★
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Bill Elder

"Shaggy Dog Stories!" 0 stars
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Jack Davis

"Sunday at the Beach!" 1/2★
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Bill Elder

"20,000 Leaks Under the Sea" ★★
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Wally Wood

"Mary Worthless!"

Since making people happy and solving their problems is the life blood of "Mary Worthless!," the new boarding house (in the Okefenokee) is just the ticket for the old dame. She takes a tour of the little shack (which actually looks huge on the inside) and meets the disturbed boarders, one by one, from the failed ballerina, Miss Leotard, who suffers from severe ballet-ache, to Constance and Lee Bickering, who are pitching plates at one another when Mary enters, but are smothering each other when she leaves. It's all in good fun until Mary gets to the end of the strip and realizes she could have stretched all these problems out for "sevens months of continuity," but solved it all in one day! Well, now we know where Forry Ackerman got all his puns.

More hilarity from "Mary Worthless!"

As dopey as this parody is, it's also the funniest thing Panic has ever run and the closest Jack Mendelsohn will ever come to the level of quality MAD reached in every issue. There's a lot to laugh at (and, yes, a lot to grimace at), including some of Mary's dialogue ("Remember, my child, money can't buy you happiness, but it'll pay for a snazzy Cadillac so you can drive around and look for it") and the painful puns (the really bad cellist who yells at the goats up above, "Hey, you kids! Get offa that roof!") but the star, without doubt, is the chameleonic Will Elder, who not only manages to ape several different styles within the same strip but manages to sprinkle some great sight gags in as well. Outside of Howard Nostrand, I can't think of a comic book artist so adept at copying others' styles (well, I mean, on purpose) as Elder, who just seems to flow from one aping to another. Of course, Elder's trademark was the marginal and background "noise," but his funny bone seems to have been on vacation for the last several months. Not being a Mary Worth follower, I googled the original strip (originally drawn by Ken Ernst and, incredibly, being published to this day!) and, ironically, every set of images that popped up contained one of those goofy close-ups Elder makes fun of throughout (a gorgeous and anonymous woman's lips, a redhead's ear, etc.). For one brief seven-page stretch, you can almost believe MAD is back!

"20,000 Leaks Under the Sea"

"20,000 Leaks Under the Sea" is a mildly amusing parody of Disney's 1954 production of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, starring James Mason and Kirk Douglas. I'll begrudgingly admit a few half-smiles cracked my otherwise-unmoving lips (well, they move when I read--does that count?), thanks to Wally Wood's version of the Nautilus and a few funny sight gags (two characters run across a chest full of "pieces of eight" on the sea floor and Wally's next panel reveals a chest full of broken number eights), but Mendelsohn still hasn't learned from Harvey that it takes more than changing character names (Nemo becomes Meno) to elicit guffaws.

Inane crap like "Shaggy Dog Stories!" and "Sunday at the Beach!" remind me why I hate this title so much. The former consists of six achingly unfunny jokes stretched out across six very long pages (not even Jack Davis's silly doodles could put a smile on my face while trying to get through this bilge), while the latter is another of Mendelsohn's family day trip diaries that no one besides Mendelsohn and Feldstein finished to the last panel (looks like Bill Elder gave up on it halfway through as well). I could have written this nonsense in my sleep and I'm one of the world's unfunniest guys. Bright side: only one issue left. -Peter

Stop! You're killing me!
Seriously!

Jack: You're right about Bill Elder, but I liked the Wally Wood story best, perhaps because I'm more familiar with the subject being parodied. This is not the worst issue of Panic ever, though it was still a chore to read. Like you, I never read Mary Worth and found the jokes slightly amusing. Jack Davis is perfect for something like the shaggy dog gags, and I admit I chuckled a few times. The beach story's art style reminded me of the work of Syd Hoff and I wonder if Elder was thinking of him when he drew this.

Craig

MD 4

"So That Others May Walk" ★
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Reed Crandall

"New Outlook" ★
Story Uncredited
Art by Joe Orlando

"Point of View" ★
Story Uncredited
Art by Graham Ingels

"Worried Sick" ★★1/2
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by George Evans

Even though her son lay dying upstairs, Mrs. Hoyt
knew there were ways to shave a few bucks off the bill.

Mrs. Hoyt is beside herself because son Danny has polio and has been placed in an iron lung. She has no one to turn to so she goes down to Dr. Wolack's office, but the doc is discussing some unimportant details with his wife on the phone and--CAN YOU PLEASE GET OFF THE PHONE YOU INCONSIDERATE QUACK MY SON IS DYING AND YOU'RE WONDERING WHAT TOYS YOU HAVE TO BUY FOR YOUR BRATS--she's getting a bit testy. Once off the phone, Dr. Wolack tries to answer Mrs. Hoyt's questions with as much patience as he can muster ("Will my son ever walk again?" "Will he be in an iron lung forever?" "Just how much is this going to cost me?" "Where the hell is that SOB husband of mine?"), before he launches into a story of a boy named Jimmy who had polio but still managed to swim and play baseball and do all those keen things kids do and then grew up to be a really good doctor named . . . Jimmy Wolack. The doctor stands and walks out of the office, with aid of canes, and Mrs. Hoyt suddenly realizes she's in good hands. Ahhhhhh . . . I never saw that ending coming! The kid in the flashback was our hero, the doc!? What are the odds? And, seriously, where is Mr. Hoyt? I gotta say that the usually reliable Reed Crandall looks as though he was as bored as I was by "So That Others May Walk." Aside from the hot Mrs. Hoyt, the rest of the panels look unfinished. Can someone tell me how it is that I always lose the coin toss and get assigned MD and Panic?

Deep down inside, Chuck is relieved he held
on to his frat pin.

Nineteen year-old Marian has everything to live for. She's pretty, she's a straight-A student, mom and dad pay her bills, and handsome Chuck is about to pin her . . . with his frat pin! Out for a joy ride with Chuck, Sandy, and Harry, Marian has never felt so alive, until Harry floors it around a sharp bend and wraps his jalopy around a tree. Harry and Sandy are killed, Chuck is thrown clear and fractures his right arm, but Marian, oh, Marian. The poor girl has a compound comminuted bilateral fracture of the mandible, a deviated septum, a depression of the Malar-Process of the Zygoma in the infra-orbital region, and a fragment of bone missing from her right mandible. No amount of Max Factor is gonna clear this up. She needs several surgeries and she needs them pronto. Chuck comes to see her but she turns him away, not wanting her beau to make Quasimodo jokes. The doctors make no promises but three plastic surgeries later and the process of healing begins. After a mere two or three panels, Doctor Wilson proudly shoves a mirror in Marian's face (along with a bill for $3,000,000.00) and shows her what a little rebar, chicken wire, and chewing gum can do in the 20th Century. Our girl is all healed and just as pretty as ever and, on cue, Chuck enters the room after eight months of abstinence and pins Marian . . . with his frat pin!

"New Outlook" is dumber than a box of rocks and twice as much fun. Even in 1955, you'd think it would come across as offensive and mean-spirited that a doctor would tell Chuck not to ask to see Marian because of "her face!" Or the traffic cop who discovers the badly-damaged girl and tells the ambulance driver, "The other girl is still alive . . . but maybe she'd be better off the other way! Her face . . .!" The uncredited writer (Wessler, I assume) loaded this one up with so much medical jargon, you can't help but be impressed even when you're not involved. Joe Orlando does his best with what's essentially oodles of panels of talking faces (or talking bandaged faces) but I almost feel cheated we didn't get to see Marian sans gauze with cameo Ghastly art!

Marian auditions for Les Yeux Sans Visage

Beth auditions for Les Visages Sans Yeux

Donald Archer awakens in a hospital bed to discover he's in bad shape after a car accident. Worse, though, is the news his wife, Ellen, is in a coma and his daughter, Beth, is badly hurt. Doctor Seldon delivers the final blow the next day with word that Ellen has died, but that some good can come from Mrs. Archer's passing. Seldon explains that a colleague has dire need of Mrs. Archer's eyes for another patient; Archer tells the doc he's a ghoul and to let him be. But, overnight, Donald changes his mind and agrees to the donation. The next day, Seldon wheels him into the patient's room and Archer recognizes the bandaged face of his daughter, resting comfortably after her Corneal Transplant.

"Point of View" was heading for a rare-as-hen's-teeth (for MD, that is) two-star rating until it came to the inane climax and the even dopier explanation from Seldon that he couldn't risk the shock to Archer if he revealed the true identity of the donee. What nonsense be this? Still, I can dream of the sequel appearing in Vault of Horror #41, "My Mother's Eyes!," where little Beth metes out vengeance for mommy (seems Donald was lit when he got behind the wheel and he was having an affair and had taken out a huge insurance policy on Ellen) by tearing daddy's eyes out and placing them in her mother's sockets (after digging up her grave). Gotta be better than this pap.

If only there had been room for one more panel!

Marty Cooper has built his business up from ten thousand a year to millions in profits, but the toll on his body has finally caught up with him. Yes, Marty has a Duodenal Ulcer which, if not properly cared for, may escalate into the Jejunal variety. From there, it's just a couple steps away from milk, soggy bread, and Carol Burnett reruns every night. Worse than the ulcer though is the fact that Marty has an EC wife, one of those selfish and ambitious ice queens who always get what they want, despite the cost. Ilene needs her furs and her big social parties and her expensive house and multiple cars and ugly (but doubtless) expensive brown culottes and Marty's health be hanged. Even when the Doc tells Marty he has to stop eating that crappy catered food at the parties, Ilene tells Marty to grow a new set and get on with life. Of course, this leads to the inevitable hemorrhage and ambulance ride to the hospital, where a skilled surgeon and team have been prepped for Marty for over two weeks. The operation is a success but Dr. Keaton warns Ilene that her husband needs complete and total relaxation and a vacation from stress and parties. Ilene agrees and explains that she'll be a better, more caring wife, and Keaton buys it. When she gets home, she brings Marty into the drawing room where a crowd of sycophants jump out and scream, "Surprise!"

Honestly, my generous rating for "Worried Sick" is mostly for that final panel (complete with a patented EC "choke . . ." from Marty), which flies in the face of what I was expecting from a story appearing in this awful title, but overall the yarn is not that bad. Marty is a likable character, your typical EC husband caught up in the web of an overbearing and demanding wife. Evans and Wessler both manage to stray from the usual six-eight panels per page of talking heads and medical mumbo-jumbo and offer us up what will doubtless go down as the best story ever to appear in the pages of MD. -Peter

Jack: Ilene Cooper should meet John Tabori's wife from this month's issue of Piracy. I think they'd have a lot to talk about. Like you, Peter, I dug that last panel in "Worried Sick." I thought "So That Others May Walk" was inspiring and find the polio epidemic endlessly fascinating. Those were some amazing plastic surgeons in "New Outlook," but poor Chuck should have come across with something better than a frat pin at the finish. "Point of View" is ridiculous and the doctor should have told the patient that the corneas were for his daughter. But then where would the drama come from?

Next Week in Star Spangled #143 . . .
The war just keeps getting Weirder!

EC Comics! It's An Entertaining Comic! Issue 67

The EC Reign Month by Month 1950-1956
67: September 1955

Panic 10

"Captain Izzy and Washt Upps"★★1/2
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Bill Elder

"A Star is Corn"★1/2
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Jack Davis

"Punch Lines"★
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Bill Elder

"Foreign Movies"★1/2
Story by Jack Mendelsohn
Art by Jack Davis

"Captain Izzy and Washt Upps" are struggling with their job on a factory line unbending bobby pins, so they complain to the boss, who sends them on an exciting mission to the North Country to inspect his property holdings. They travel by plane to Roughantough, where they fight with the local bruisers until they are tied up and taken to the boss, who single-handedly knocks out everyone in town. Their task accomplished, they fly home.

"A Star is Corn"

In a lifetime of reading comic books and comic strips, I'll be darned if I ever read a Wash Tubbs story, and these parodies are not as funny as they might be if the reader is unfamiliar with the object of the parody. Still, perhaps because Mad is no longer a comic book and thus not grabbing all the good stuff, this seems above-average for a Panic story, with nice art by Elder (no surprise there) and humorous background gags. There is even a Bob and Ray reference on page three!

Matinee idol Normal Mainliner discovers stage performer Esther Blodgett and takes her under his wing, quickly running her through the star-making machine and turning her into a movie queen. She marries him despite his drunkenness and he disappears into the ocean, though Esther does not realize that he has found a mermaid to make into his next star.

I must admit I've never seen any version of A Star is Born, either. I am suddenly feeling quite ignorant, and it's all due to Panic. "A Star is Corn" is not very funny, but it is squarely in line with the sort of movie parodies that would sustain Mad magazine for many decades to come and Jack Davis is skilled at caricature.

"Punch Lines" fills six pages with 12 half-page gags. I didn't smile once. I was surprised to see from the credits that Elder drew this, because it's so straightforward and unimaginative. There's even a Reggie van Gleason character in one of the gags, which is about as dated as it gets.

"Punch Lines"

"Foreign Movies"

John loses his job and finally tells Marsha, who pledges to see it through together. That's the premise that sets up a series of one-page "Foreign Movies," looking at how the same situation would be handled by different countries in world cinema. We see French, British, and Italian versions of this scene, followed by Japanese, Russian, and American examples. There are a few faint smiles to be had, and Jack Davis does bigfoot art as well as anyone, but this issue of Panic was a real letdown after a promising start.
-Jack

"Captain Izzy and Washt Upps"

Peter: There are a couple decent one-liners in "Captain Izzy" (I'm a sucker for the fourth-wall jokes) but, otherwise, it's another bad send-up of a (now) obscure strip that I know nothing about. Sad thing is that I feel even if I knew the strip intimately, this would still be embarrassingly unfunny. But there are those two or three funny lines, something which is missing in spades in "A Star is Corn" (Ho! Ho! What a riotous title that one, eh?), which sees Jack Mendelsohn again switching out names of characters (in this case, Norman Mainliner instead of Norman Maine) and considering that hilarious. I can just picture Mendelsohn in his office cracking himself up with his own work. "Foreign Movies" and "Punch Lines" are so inane that they make me wonder if editor Feldstein hadn't, by this time, just thrown up his hands and said "I give up!" and okayed anything Mendelsohn submitted. How else to explain six pages wasted on bad alcoholic jokes and a further seven devoted to the same scene done in different languages (and none of them funny)?

Krigstein

 Piracy 6

"Fit for a King"★★★
Story Uncredited
Art by Reed Crandall

"The Skipper"★★★
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by George Evans

"Fur Crazy"★★
Story Uncredited
Art by Graham Ingels

"Solitary"★★1/2
Story Uncredited
Art by Jack Davis

An old derelict named Adam sleeps next to the fire at a British pub until he is awakened to tell the story of Long Ben Avery, the king of the pirates! Insisting that Avery was a fool, Adam recalls that Ben incited mutiny on the Charles, looted an English merchant ship, and sailed for Madagascar, where he revealed his plan to rob the treasure ship of the Great Mogul's Mocha Fleet. Despite difficult odds, his plan succeeds, and Avery recovers a large cache of treasure. He abandons his crew and sails for America, where he is chagrined to learn that the poor citizens of that new country can't afford jewels. Returning to London in search of a buyer, he is robbed and beaten; left tetched in the head, he wanders the streets, unaware of the jewels that remain in his pouch. Old Adam's tale done, he is kicked out of the pub for being a liar. He walks along the docks until he finds the quarters of the king's soldiers and turns himself in--he is none other than Ben Avery, long-missing pirate!

"Fit for a King"

This issue of Piracy is off to a solid start with "Fit for a King," a straightforward, old-fashioned tale of a pirate whose life did not turn out as well as he had hoped. It's not a big surprise that Adam is Ben Avery, but Reed Crandall can always be counted on to tell a pleasing visual tale.

Tired of being passed over for a ship captain's job, Richard Carson sets about sabotaging the Yorkton. The anchor disappears, the cargo shifts, the hold is set afire. Finally, the man who longs to be "The Skipper" fiddles with the compass so that the ship is steered through fog and onto rocks. The crew and captain abandon ship and, as the vessel goes down, Carson is excited that he finally can be the captain!

It's tough to say whose art is better in this issue of Piracy between Crandall and George Evans, but I have to give the prize to Evans by just a bit. Wessler's story doesn't hold any real surprises but it's fun to watch Carson's mad pursuit of power unfold, especially with Evans as a guide.

"Fur Crazy"

Gus Marker clings to an ice floe in the Arctic Sea until he washes ashore, only to find an abandoned Eskimo village of igloos. Hunkering down under a rotting fur, he thinks back to how he had led a party of men into the snowy wilds to kill seals for their pelts. Greed led him to wipe out the herds and thus destroy the food supply of the Eskimo; on his way back to civilization, his ship was destroyed in a storm and he ended up in the sea. Desperately hungry, he comes across the ship's stores, washed ashore, but finds no food--only pelts.

"Fur Crazy" is a depressing story with mediocre art by Ingels. Once again, the surprise ending is no surprise and, while Marker certainly earns his fate, I would have liked to have seen just a bit more characterization here. I'm an old protester against seal hunting, so I'm not unhappy to see this guy get his comeuppance.

"Solitary"

Captain Jonathan Wade is a tyrant aboard ship but he harbors a terrible secret; he and two of his crew abandoned everyone on a prior ship and escaped in the only longboat. He sends crewman Hayes off alone to find a desert island after Hayes commits a minor infraction, but when his two comrades are washed overboard in a typhoon the captain loses his mind and is stripped of his command by the crew. He sets off in a longboat by himself, looking for the two men, and lands on a desert island where he comes face to face with none other than Hayes! The angry crewman takes the longboat and paddles off, leaving Wade alone on the island to suffer the pangs of conscience.

A bit confusing and overly packed with plot, "Solitary" is not helped by the art of Jack Davis. It can be hard to take anything he draws seriously at times. The absurd coincidence of Wade landing on the same desert island as Hayes is hard to accept, but the final panel, reproduced here, is haunting in its sparseness.-Jack

"The Skipper"

Peter: On the exact opposite end of the quality spectrum from Panic we find Piracy, the New Direction's best title. That bold statement is backed up by proof this issue in the form of "The Skipper," a chilling study of escalating madness that defies expectations of softening by story's end. The single panel of Carson, going down with the ship, screaming "I'm Captain! Skipper of the Yorkton!," is about as scary as anything offered up in the horror titles. Can't say enough about George Evans's art, which shows Carson's mania deepen with each successive panel. Potent stuff. The "twist" that comes at the climax of "Fit for a King" is a bit obvious but the tale that precedes it is a good, rousing one and Reed Crandall is fast becoming Piracy's MVP. "Fur Crazy" isn't bad but contains what has to be the crudest Graham Ingels art we've seen, perhaps courtesy of a phantom inker? Or maybe Graham was just winding it down. "Solitary" puts the bow on an excellent issue, with Jack Davis giving us some of his best work in a long time. The final panel, of Wade alone in a sea of white, is nearly as powerful as that of "The Skipper."

Craig

M.D. 3

"When You Know How" ★★
Story Al Feldstein?
Art by Joe Orlando

"The Right Cure" ★1/2
Story Al Feldstein?
Art by Graham Ingels

"Shock Treatment" ★1/2
Story Al Feldstein?
Art by George Evans

"The Lesson" ★★1/2
Story by Carl Wessler
Art by Reed Crandall

There go the white carpets!

Little Tad just wants to hang out with the big boys but that means taking risks, so when the other kids dare Tad to take his sled down Snake Hill, he naturally takes the challenge. Unfortunately, the trip down doesn’t go as smoothly as the trip up and Tad ends up with broken ribs, internal bleeding and, most important of all, a pierced thorax. Luckily, the other boys are able to wave down Trooper Benson, who throws Tad into his car and treks through the feet-deep snow back to his place, where he calls Doc Yates and tells him to bring his kit over pronto. Since the roads are all closed, they can’t take Tad into the local hospital so Doc Yates must perform an emergency thoracotomy (sawing of the ribs to reach the yucky stuff) with only two cans of coffee, a chainsaw, and a pack of Marlboros. The surgery is a success and Tad is back on Snake Hill in no time! For what it is (a boring medical story), "When You Know How" really isn’t that bad but it goes on and on and, as if all the medical definitions weren’t boring enough, we get a crossover with Psychoanalysis when Tad’s mom swears he’ll never sled again and Doc Yates lectures her on growing up and the dangers of coddling her son.

"The Right Cure"

Ma Venable has got herself a right ol’ pain in her midsection and none of the medicines she’s been subscribed to by the local herbists seem to be a'heppin'. Not the swamp grass nor the moldy bread nor the lizard gizzards; why not even the crayfish stewed in donkey’s milk an’ mushroom stems, pickled in vinegar and stewed in wine did the trick. She just can't seem to find "The Right Cure"! Now this pain inside is almighty awful and her husband won’t listen to her edjacated daughter and take her to a proper doctor until it’s nigh on too late! She begs her husband to jest shoot her with the family rifle but Pa don’t want no part of that, so’s young Jennie goes into town and begs Dr. Harold Benson, MD, to come have a look at her ailin’ ma. One look at the dyin’ woman and Doc Benson knows he has to get her to the hospital, but Pa’s all fired-up mad about this here quack comin’ into his house and it takes Jennie aimin’ both barrels of a shotgun at him before he sees some sense (well, some sense). The Doc speeds Ma to the ER, where he performs an emergency appendicealectomy on the woman’s abscessed organ. Everything else seems to be in good working order so the Doc sews her up and changes out of his smock just in time for Pa to show up with his gun loaded for bear. But one look at his resting wife and Pa is a changed man. Graham Ingels was always the go-to guy for swamp folk and he does another bang-up job here. The script is what it is, another annotated surgical performance that has a hard time working up any excitement for the audience. Not that there was much of an audience by this time (though the letters page, reprinted far below, proves there were at least fifteen consumers out there hungry for a publication dedicated to psoriasis (no, not psychoanalysis!) and thrombosis (if not coloproctology).

"Shock Treatment"

Dr. Arnold Ross is called to the home of the Mortons, a family he's been treating for years, to diagnose son Larry's abdominal pain. What he finds is a nightmare of parental disorder and attempted suicide. Morton explains to Mom and Pop Morton that Larry can no longer deal with his surroundings, with the constant bickering between the couple, and his displeasure has manifested itself into extreme depression. Not even a two-tenths solution of Potassium Permanganate will help.  The only cure for Larry, the Doc explains, is "Shock Treatment"! Quicker than you can say "Two grams of Chloral Hydrate, three-tenths gram of Barbital, and six CCs of Paraldehyde," Larry is strapped to a table, greased up, and zapped. The kid comes out of the therapy an amnesiac but forgetting about Mom and Dad fighting over whether it'll be Jack Benny or I Love Lucy on the tube seems to be just the ticket. In fact, Mr. and Mrs. Morton embrace and let on that the Doc has shown them the error of their ways and love is in bloom. The only thing I don't hate about this turkey is the George Evans art. George's moody work (especially in the "therapy room" scene) perfectly captures the intensity of the situation, something Al Feldstein's cold and analytical words completely miss. It is interesting to see how accepted this controversial practice was in the mid-1950s. According to Wikipedia, shock therapy is still used (Carrie Fisher is one of the most famous patients) but not as widespread as it was back then.

"The Lesson"

Young Frank Marley is out joy-riding in his Pop's jalopy, showing off for his best girl, Eve, when he loses control of the car in the driving rain. Luckily, someone sees the crash and calls an ambulance. Frank is taken out of the car but Eve remains, badly hurt. Frank recognizes Dr. Somners, who enters the wreck and examines Eve, shouting out orders to the ambulance drivers. They whisk Frank and Eve away to a local hospital where Eve undergoes an emergency cranioplasty (for you laymen out there, that's a cutting open of the skull to remove bad stuff on the brain) but Dr. Somners has a special punishment awaiting young Marley, who's beside himself over the condition of his girl, as he takes the kid into the operating room while they slice and dice. Eve comes through with flying colors and the gore has reduced Frank to a driver who will slow down for a yellow light and look both ways at a four-way stop from now on. Dr. Somners takes Marley into Eve's room to look in on the recovering girl and she awakens and plants a kiss on her doctor/father's cheek. Can you believe it? They're related!

Actually, despite my sarcasm, I liked "The Lesson" more than any story that's been presented within the closed quarters of MD covers so far. It's not Reed Crandall's art, which is uncharacteristically blah this time around (Frank Marley walks around with a bigger hunch on his back than Quasimodo and looks like a man in his thirties in the intro), but I enjoyed the straightforward story and, of course, the loopy twist in the final panel. I'm glad that Dr. Somners's insistence that Frank view the operation wasn't without comment (Frank's pop pretty much threatens legal action), but didn't little Franky do well during his first cranioplasty? -Peter

Jack- Peter, I am shocked that you totally ignored the gay subtext in "When You Know How" (even the title screams it!). Tad doesn't have the nerve to "ride the snake" so his friends tell him to "beat it." In the end, the old doctor tells the little boy "everything's easy when you know how." Couldn't be more obvious, eh what? I also got a kick out of the doctor blaming Tad's mother while her son is recovering from surgery on the kitchen table!

"The Right Cure" is weighed down by more poor art from Ingels, who seems to be about done with the whole comic book thing if his efforts this month are any indication. The story itself is dreadful and the final pun a clunker. I was hoping for a good-old EC close-up of the kid getting "Shock Treatment," but George Evans stays classy and doesn't show it. Too bad EC comics got tame! The art by Evans is the issue's visual highlight. I too liked "The Lesson," but I thought Crandall's art was outstanding. Now those were the days when the same doctor would set a broken leg, set a broken arm, and then do brain surgery all in one shot! The ending was a complete surprise to me. In all, not a terrible comic, but I'd love to see the sales figures.

Next Week . . .
What could possibly be worse
than a stinkin' Nazi?