Vampirella 2

Bill Hughes provides the cover for this issue of Vampirella, dated November 1969. Tom Sutton provides the story and art for the frontispiece "Vampi's Feary Tales".

First is "Evily" by Jerry Grandenetti (art) and Bill Parente (story). Evily is a sorceress who is Vampirella's cousin, living in a castle in the Black Forest of Vaalgania. She invites a number of guests to her castle for a party who are revealed to be monsters. She also brings back a number of people to the dead from her basement. The monsters bring her a cloaked figure which ends up being Vampirella in a cameo role. Vampirella demands Evily's throne and a spell of Evily is bounced back at her by her mirror, turning her into a cat. Some good art by Grandenetti, but a rather weak start to the issue.

Next is "Montezuma's Monster" by Tony Williamsune (art) and Don Glut (story). A trio of men head to Mexico to search for Montezuma's treasure. They eventually find it in a cave where they also find some mummified corpses and a drawing of Quetzalcoatl, a flying serprent that is said can turn any winged thing into itself. The men take the treasure and start heading back to the U.S. Along the way a buzzard turns into Quetzalcoatl and kills one of the men. The other men try to kill any bird they find along the way to prevent it from happening again. One of them plots to kill the other, but is killed by Quetzalcoatl, who had transformed from a mosquito, at the last second. The final man gets back to civilization and thinks he's made it back safely at the airport, but the airplane turns into Quetzalcoatl and kills him.

Third is "Down to Earth!", this issue's Vampirella story, by Mike Royer (art) and Forrest Ackerman (story). This story is notable for being the only instance where an issue had a Vampirella story but it did not lead off the issue. The story also features Vampirella's twin sister Draculina, in her sole appearance, who acts as host. This story features Vampirella trying out for a Monsterella contest at the Warren offices where she is selected the winner by James Warren and Forrest Ackerman, giving her the name Bambi Aurora. Traveling on a plane to Hollywood, a bolt of lightning strikes it, blowing it up. An absolutely horrific story with a ridiculous ending, this is probably the worst Vampirella story of all time. Thankfully this would be the last time Royer or Ackerman did a Vampirella story and she wouldn't start in a story again until issue 8.

Fourth is "Queen of Horror!" by Dick Piscopo (art) and Don Glut (story). Similar themed to the previous story, it is about a monster movie director, Katzman who is looking for a new hot theme since his movies haven't done well lately. His assistant, with the help of a "Gorry Hackerman" (an obvious nod to Forrest Ackerman) comes up with the idea of having a female monster. Their actress is found in a bar, a woman named Mildred who is soon renamed to Adriana. Adriana does very well in a series of hit monster movies. One night Katzman invites her to his home, telling her he is in love with her. Adriana tells him no man could be happy with her and reveals that she actually is a monster, transforming into a werewolf who kills him. Adriana looks enough like Vampirella that I half expected it to end up being her while reading the story.

Next is "The Octopus" by William Barry (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). A man named Gary is invited to his brother Carl's home along with his two children where he is shown a large octopus in the well. Carl brings Gary underwater with him to investigate where he kills him in order to get his inheritance. He later tries to kill Gary's children by pushing them into the well but falls in when they move out of the way and is killed by the Octopus. Carl later returns in Octopus form to kill the children but is killed by the corpse of Gary, who has returned to protect his childen.

Sixth is "One, Two, Three" by Ernie Colon (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). A pair of androids, Kleet and Lia are brought in front of a trio of robot judges, on trial for showing emotion. Flashbacks show how they got to this point, with Lia reading fairy tales to the children she takes care of. She becomes obsessed with being rescued by a hero and is thrown out of her master's home when a man comes to the door and she asks him to take her with him. She is pursued by robot searchers and is found by Kleet when she is found playing with flowers in a field. Kleet brings her to an abandoned post but they are eventually caught and brought before the judges. The two are found guilty and brought out to a home in the desert. They are destroyed soon after however when it is revealed that the home is on a nuclear bomb testing site.

The issue concludes with "Rhapsody in Red!" by Billy Graham (art) and Don Glut (story). A husband and wife are caught in a big rainstorm in Transylvania and come across a large castle. Inside the castle they meet the mysterious Countess Margat Sinovitz who lets them stay there. The two of them suspect the Countess is a vampire due to the lack of electricity and mirrors in the castle as well as her strong, bat-like hearing. She attacks the husband, turning him into a vampire. She wants him to become her husband but he instead bites his wife, making her a vampire as well and kills the Countess with a sword.

Creepy 30

Here's Creepy 30, which came out right around the start of Warren's rebuilding period. The cover is by Bill Hughes, featuring a Frankenstein-like monster. The frontis is "Creepy's Loathsome Lore: Exorcism!" by Tom Sutton (story & art).

First up is "The Mind of the Monster!" by Ernie Colon (art) and R. Michael Rosen (story). A scientist creates a bizarre three-headed, three-armed monster to defeat a beast on Mars that has been killing monsters. Only the intelligent monster, who has no reason to kill such a monster, decides to kill the scientists instead.

Next is "Drop In!" by Tom Sutton (art) and Don Glut (story), about an Earthquake thats about to occur in Los Angeles. Eventually the Earthquake does occur, killing everyone left in the city.

Third is "The Haunted Sky!" by Roger Brand (art) and Archie Goodwin (story), originally from Creepy 17. A pilot encounters his dead colleagues while aflight in an experimental airplane. Although the doctors don't initially believe him, there is proof left behind of the ghost's existence.

Next is "The River", another reprint, from Creepy 15 with story & art by Johnny Craig. A pair of thieves try to escape using the river, but one has second thoughts and is killed by his colleague. Although he is shot at, he is able to escape and is helped by an old man on a boat. However, it ends up the old man is bringing him to the lake of the dead.

Fifth story is "To Be Or Not To Be A Witch" by Carlos Prunes (art) and Bill Parente (story). Prunes was a spanish artist from Selecciones Illustrada who'd make his sole appearance here about a year and a half or so before many other S.I. artists started coming over. A man whose accused many of being witches visits an accused family lying to them about needing help removing a demon from him. Luckily for him it fails, as he truly is a demon, and kills them.

Sixth is "Piece By Piece" by Joe Orlando (art) and Archie Goodwin (story), reprinted from Creepy 14. A scientist creates a Frankenstein-like monster from five different people and takes the brain from his assistant. The monster takes revenge upon the townfolk who were mean to him when he was still alive, only for the corpses of the five people whom is body is made up of to climb out of there graves and take back all their body parts.

Last is "Dr. Jekyll's Jest" by Mike Royer (art) and R. Michael Rosen (story). A man believes his cruel colleague is abusing patients, and eventually finds that his fiance was experimented on and killed by him. Only it ends up that his colleague, Dr. Jekyll was the true culprit all along.

A so-so issue, nothing to great here, and half the issue's reprints so can't be too pleased about that.

Vampirella 10

After two days away, I'm back with a new issue of Vampirella.

This early issue of Vampirella is a rarity in that there is no Vampirella story. While she hosts the majority of the stories in the issue, her usual own story is strangely absent.

Behind the Bill Hughes cover is the frontis, "Vampi's Feary Tales" The Face of Medusa", by Billy Graham.

First up is "Fiends in the Night!" by Tom Sutton (art) and Buddy Saunders (story). This story was clearly meant for Creepy, as it is hosted by Uncle Creepy instead of Vampirella. The story is about a crook who steals a small chest from an old man, who curses him. Finding only a book in the chest, he tosses it aside. Fleeing from the city in the midst of winter, he is confronted by ghouls, werewolves and a vampire. He goes back to get the book, thinking that it holds spells that he'll be able to use to defend himself, only to find it frozen shut as a bunch of rotting corpses start after him.

Up next is "The Marriage" by Ralph Reese (art) and Steve Skeates (story). Its about a man so obsessed with building a machine that his girlfriend leaves him. He punches the machine and is electrocuted to death, but is brought back to life by the machine which keeps him alive solely to do chores for it. Reese's art kind of looks like Richard Corben's in this story.

"Eye of Newt, Toe of Frog" is third, with art by Frank Brunner and story by Gerald Conway. It's about a woman whose annoyed by her husband so she looks into the black arts. She soon finds things too much for her to handle, and it ends up that her husband was into the stuff the whole time too.

"The Soft, Sweet Lips of Hell!", with art by Steve Englehart & Neal Adams and written by Denny O'Neil is next, about a succubus who falls in love with a boxer being pressured by the mob. The boxer is killed, but she uses her power to bring him back to life, with the price being her life.

"War of the Wizards" is the fifth story, and is both written and drawn by Wally Wood. It's about a pair of rival wizards who use a soldier in their fight between each other. The soldier is able to defeat both wizards, and is revealed to be a wizard himself. As usual, Wood's art is quite good, and the story, while not having a horror theme, is pretty good too.

"A Thing of Beauty" is this issue's cover story, with art by Billy Graham and written by Len Wein. Its about a very beautiful actress who fakes a relationship with a very ugly special effects producer to get publicity. Upon finding out how she really feels about him, he switches her with a dummy of hers that gets set on fire, killing her.

Last up is "Regeneration Gap", once again with art by Tom Sutton and written by Chuck McNaughton. With over-population, food shortages and pollution destroying the Earth, a spaceship departs to space. Returning to Earth 100 years later, a man returns as all that's let of humanity and finds Earth a wasteland except for a single beautiful woman who keeps talking about 'purifying him'. The woman ends up being a blob-like creature and turns him into one too. I'll probably lean towards this one as my favorite story from the issue.

A so-so issue. Sutton and Wood's stories are quite good, while the others are average at best.