Vampirella 108

Yet another Enrich cover starts off this issue of Vampirella. Jose Gonzalez provides artwork for the table of conents.

First is "Spawn of the Star Beast" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Rich Margopoulos (story). Vampi once again fights a star beast who arrives on Earth from a meteor and starts attacking people so it can spread its spawn around the Earth. Vampi and Conrad are able to defeat the monster.

Next is the second part of "Sweetwater Nessie" by Auraleon (art) and Don McGregor (story). Our heroes look for the Loch Ness Monster to photograph it, but instead it ends up being captured and apparantely killed. The series ended abrubtly here and was not concluded in Vampi's two final non-reprint issues.

Third is "Circus Monstrous", which ended up being Pantha's final story. Art is by Jose Ortiz and story is by David Allikas. Pantha along with Arrowsmith search for a man who can turn into a Panther like her. They arrive at a circus with a freak show with many part animal part human freaks. The freaks are all artificial, products of surgery but end up getting revenge on the owner and turn him into a freak like them.

Fourth is "The Beast Lies Sleeping", the latest 'The Fox' story, by Luis Bermejo (art) and Nicola Cuti. Our heroes continue with their quest, this time heading to an archaeological site. By this point I've grown pretty bored with this series.

Fifth is the third part of "Jeremy" by Paul Gillon (story & art). Rudy Nebres provides an uncredited first page. Jeremy has headed out to sea, only to be picked up by a group of pirates. There he is forced to be a servant for a young girl who is a hostage of theirs. Eventually some man of war ships arrive, there is a big battle and the ship is destroyed, but both Jeremy and the girl, Dona Aurelia make it out okay.

Last story is "Torpedo, 1936" by Alex Toth (art) and Sanchez Abuli (story). This story was originally printed in the spanish version of Creepy. It features a hit man who falls in love with a girl he has been hired to kill, so he lets her live and uses her clothes to claim credit for killing her. Eventually the money runs out and she starts seeing other men behind his back, so he ends up hiring someone to kill her.

Vampirella 106

One of the last original Vampirella magazines to come out is today's entry, with a cover by Enrich. Jose Gonzalez as usual provides a drawing of Vampirella on the Table of Contents page.

Vampirella's story for this issue is "A Love Blessed in Hell" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Rich Margopoulos (story). Vampi's deceased husband from Drakulon, Tristan suddenly arrives at her door. It is a very happy number of days for our heroine, but in reality this is not the real Tristan, but rather a clone made by a sorceress who plans for him to kill Vampi. When it is time to kill her however he refuses, and instead heads back to the sorceress and kills her. Alas, Vampi has no idea what is going on and is saddened by his sudden dissappearance. A short story, but extremely good art by Gonzalez, probably his sexiest drawings of Vampirella to ever be in the magazine.

Next is the first part of "Sweetwater Nessie" by Auraleon (art) and Don McGregor (story). This story features the Loch Ness Monster and a family from an Oceanographic Institute which arrives to investigate it. While McGregor's story doesn't seem to go anywhere, the scenes with the Loch Ness monster are quite nice. It has a cameo appearance on pretty much every page while the rest of the story is happening.

Third is "On the Trail of the Cat", the latest story in the Pantha series. Art is by Jose Ortiz and story is by Rich Margopoulos. Conrad reveals to Adam and Pantha that they couldn't have normal children, so they break up. Vampi is chased by a hunter who has been hired to kill a man who can turn into a panther, and who thinks Pantha is that man. While he captures her, Pantha convinces him to let her become his traveling companion instead.

Fourth is "The Fox and the Deer", the latest segment in the Fox series. Art is by Luis Bermejo, with story by Nicola Cuti. Ming and Will go to visit an old teacher of hers, Chin-Li, but instead find him executed by Dung-Bin, a man who seeks Chin-Li's daughter. The daughter tells him to hunt a deer and then she'll marry him. He does so, but when he kills the deer he finds her corpse there instead, as she used the similar shapeshifting ability that our heroine has. Because of this, he is executed. A fairly good self-contained story that doesn't have the usual "The Fox" logo on it, but is obviously part of the series.

Fifth is part two of "Jeremy" by Paul Gillon (story & art). In this part Jeremy continues to be pursued by the Indian Tribe which he escaped from in the previous story. He manages to kill some of them, but is captured. Luckily, he is able to escape from them and even steal a boat, which he uses to escape from the island. An okay story, but I wonder why this story which has no horror or supernatural elements to it whatsoever is in a horror magazine.

The issue concludes with "Safari" by Esteban Maroto (art) and David Allikas (story). A man wins an olympic event only to find him brought on a spaceship to a primitive planet where he finds himself attacked by various creatures. Soon he realizes that he is being hunted by an ape-like man, who kills him, chops off his head, and puts it up on his wall as a trophy.

Overall, a fairly good issue with better than usual segments of Vampi, The Fox and Pantha, and a good conclusion to the issue with Safari.