Vampirella 111

Warren reaches a new low with this all reprint issue of Vampirella from January 1983. The cover, by Pujolar, is actually a reprinted cover from the magazine Devilina, a competitor to Warren! Unbelievable that they'd take a competitor's cover to use for one of their issues.

First is "Vampirella and the Curse of the Macdaemons" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Mike Butterworth (story, as Flaxman Loew), from issue 28. The Macdaemons of the title are a family who lives in Scotland. As the son of the family comes of age he is forced to watch over the family secret. Vampi and Pendragon come there on vacation and meet Alastair, who tells Vampi of how an ancestor of his was forced to mate with a sea monster. Alastair plans to feed Pendragon to the creature, but when he lets it go, it instead attacks him, jealous over the attention he's paid to Vampirella. Vampirella then bites it in her bat form, killing it. This story is continued with the next story.

Second is "Vampirella and the Undead of the Deep!" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Mike Butterworth (story, as Flaxman Loew), from issue 29. Vampi witnesses the burial of Alastair, who is being carried into the water. Vampi goes under water where she sees many dead bodies at a ball. She also finds Tristan down there, but he soon transforms into a watery beast after tricking her into getting rid of her blood substitute. Vampi escapes and bites the dead bodies down there to get the blood she needs.

Third is "The Time Eater" by Paul Neary (art) and Jack Butterworth (story), from issue 40. A sci-fi themed story that is very interesting and unique. One of Warren's most unique stories in fact. The Time Eater of the title is an entity that exists out in space, consuming time. As the story begins, the time eater is quickly reaching the point where it has consumed all future time. As a result, it has to start eating the past. We see the Time Eater consumer the past, causing time to go back further and further. A spaceship that approached the Time Eater lands back on Earth, then is deassembled. People who have died come back to life, then grow young, and eventually return to their mother's womb. Humankind de-evolves as does all other life. Eventually the Earth itself ceases to exist and the universe slowly shrinks until it too is gone. At this point the time eater has eaten all time that has ever existed and soon starves to death. A gaseous particle breaks off the time eater, causing the universe to slowly start reforming again. Time once again starts to pass by, the universe slowly returns to normal and the time eater eventually comes back to life to start the process all over again.

Fourth is "The Munificent Ali Addan and Son!" by Esteban Maroto (art) and Bill Dubay & Maroto (story), from issue 68. The art on this story is printed sideways. This story features the son of Ali Addan, who encounters a beautiful woman who has set up a trap for him. He battles a warrior and defeats him, and the woman is revealed to be Ali Addan's daughter. Her mother, a monster appears and kills Ali's son.

Fifth is "Force Feed" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Cary Bates (story), from issue 59. A killer who is on the run from the police finds a scientist who is able to transport him to someone else's body in another time. He proves it by letting him tempoorarily be in Jack the Ripper. But when they go ahead with transporting him to someone else's body, the scientist, knowing the killer is a vegitarian, has him turned into a Tyranosaurus Rex.

Sixth is "Fog" by Carmine Infantino & Dick Giordano (art) and Nicola Cuti (story), from issue 62. This story features a dangerous fog that chases a couple. They are able to escape from it, but it adapts by turning into a liquid, and getting at them that way.

Last is "The French Coagulation" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Carl Wessler & Gerry Boudreau (story), from issue 39. Bermejo's first Warren story in its original appearance, his art here is simply amazing, arguably the best job he ever did for Warren. In Paris law enforcement investigate the death of a woman at the hand of the "Loup Garou" which is essentially a werewolf. Due to a key in the victim's hands, they are able to pintpoint the creature down to one of six people. They lock them up in jail cells and the night of the full moon one of them, a woman, turns into the werewolf and kills her husband, who is in the cell with her. It ends up the husband was sleeping with the wife of one of the cops which is why he locked him in the cell with her.

Eerie 81

Frank Frazetta provides the famous cover for this issue of Eerie, featuring a giant naked woman on the top of the Empire State Building, holding a gorilla in her hands (an obvious parody of King Kong). This cover was originally produced six years earlier when Warren was planning on publishing an adult magazine called "POW!". That magazine never came to be, so Warren held onto the cover for years, eventually using it here in February 1977. All of the stories in this issue are based on this cover.

First is "Goodbye, Bambi Boone" by Carmine Infantino & Dick Giordano (art) and Cary Bates (story). Bambi Boone is a giant sized actress who grew to a great size after an experiment to increase the size of her breasts went horribly wrong. Bambi is upset at people not taking her seriously in her roles, and when she takes part in a movie similar to King Kong she asks her manager to assist her in feeling actual pain when she is fired upon by planes during the shooting. The manager loads the planes with real bullets however and she is killed during the shooting. The manager knew that she was dying due to her great size, so he set up this up to have her killed.

Second is "Taking of Queen Bovine" by Ramon Torrents (art) and Gerry Boudreau (story). Queen Bovine of the title is a secret agent who takes responsibility for helping Gnik Gnok, a member of a chimp race that is planning on invading Earth. Thinking they are going to be wiped out, he defects to the human race to prevent the invasion from taking place. Bovine assists him and in order to protect him climbs a skyscraper where she is killed by the chimp invaders.

Third is "The Bride of Congo: The Untold Story" by Carmine Infantino & Gonzalo Mayo (story) and Bill Dubay (story). This story takes place after the original King Kong story. Amy, the woman captured by him is still obsessed with Kong, even after her death and even after getting married to a human man. She eventually finds out that King Kong didn't actually die, but is wounded and needs a blood transfusion. She volunteers but it ends up turning her into a giant size as well. She leaves and grabs onto her husband, who is dressed in an ape suit, heading to the Empire State Building. King Kong comes after her and the two leave to his home, to be happily ever after.

Fourth is "You're A Big Girl Now" by Richard Corben (art) and Bruce Jones (story). Except for the first and last pages, this story is in color. This story features Rachel, a girl who is born at a huge size and continues to grow larger and larger as she gets older. Lowery, a newspaper reporter befriends her when she is still a child. When she grows up she gets upset when she finds out he doesn't love her like she loves him. Fearful of her continuously growing size the military tries to destroy her and she goes on a rampage in New York city, looking for the Statue of Liberty, which she believes to be her mother. Many years later aliens find her body and realize that she grew so large that she ended up destroying the Earth.

Fifth is "Starchild" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Louise Jones & David Micheline (story). The 'Starchild' of the title is an artificially created giant woman who is sent to another planet with her normal sized brother to build a city. There she meets some apes that live nearby and befriends them. Her brother is ordered to either retrieve her or destroy her. Not wanting to harm her, he leaves her there, deciding to lie about her being destroyed.

Sixth is "The Giant Ape Suit" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). In this story it is revealed that King Kong was actually a giant robot. The brother of the man who controlled the robot seeks to build another one years later by finding the lab where it was built. He is betrayed by a pair of criminals that he was going to work with, and they head to the lab, where they find a robot of a giant naked woman. One of the criminals betrays the other and takes control of the robot, heading through the city and climbing a building before being knocked off and destroyed.

Last is "Golden Girl" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). A company inspector arrives on a planet but quickly forgets her mission when she hears that there is a city of gold nearby. The men there bring her there, where the city is revealed to be a miniature version of New York City. When she heads into the city she is attacked by the miniature locals, sprayed with gold, and turned into their own version of the Statue of Liberty.

Creepy 113

Berni Wrightson provides a dinosaur themed cover for this issue of Creepy, a reprint issue dedicated to the artist. Wrightson also provides the art for the table of contents page. This issue is dated November 1979. With multiple stories written by him, Wrightson proves here that he's quite the good writer too.

First is, "The Muck Monster" by Berni Wrightson (story & art), from Eerie 68. This story was originally printed in color, but is black and white here. Wrightson's version of the Frankentein monster, this is about a scientist who tries to bring a corpse to lie, but the corpse has no desire to live. The scientist in an angry fit destroys the monster in a vat of acid and dumps the remains in the drain. The remains drip down the hill and once reaching a body comes to life. The monster returns to the scientist's lab, driving him crazy, then sits down on the hill, for good. Really good art in this story.

Second is "The Laughing Man" by Berni Wrightson (art) and Bruce Jones (story), from Creepy 95. This story features a man found by a doctor in the African jungles laughing maniacally. With some drugs the man calms down and tells how he and his business partner headed to the African jungles in an attempt to find intelligent chimps. They catch one dead, and our protagonist's business partner skins the creature and uses it as a costume to attract another one. He vanishes after a while and turns up later, but it ends up he is actually an ape, wearing the dead partner's skin as a costume! A terrific story, unfortunately it would be Wrightson's last Warren story in its original printing.

Third is "The Pepper Lake Monster" by Berni Wrightson (story & art), from Eerie 58. A terrific story, perhaps Wrightson's best. A man whose job it is to seek out sea monsters finally finds a real one in the small town of Pepper Lake. When the town folk refuse to help him, he comes up with an elaborate contraption to capture it and succeeds. When he tells the town folk how famous he'll be for capturing it however, they kill him since removing the monster will remove any reason for someone to come to the town.

Fourth is "Clarice" by Berni Wrightson (art) and Bruce Jones (story), from Creepy 77. This story is a poem about a man longing for his dead wife, who died by accident when she was locked outside in the cold one night while he slept and froze to death. His wife comes back to life as a corpse and returns to the cabin, where they are reunited. One significant screw up occurs however (not sure whether it was Jones or Wrightson's fault) when the artwork shows an uncovered window that the wife could have broken and got inside through.

Fifth is "Cool Air" by Berni Wrightson, adapted from the HP Lovecraft story, originally from Eerie 62. This classic tale tells of a man who moves into a new boarding house where he befriends his neighbor who lives upstairs, Dr. Munoz. Munoz suffers from a disease which forces him to keep his apartment at a very cold temperature continuously. One day his machine that keeps the temperature cold breaks, and while the main character brings as much ice as he can Munoz rots away as it ends up he was dead the entire time and looked like a normal person because of the cold.

Sixth is "Country Pie" by Berni Wrightson & Carmine Infantino (art) and Bruce Jones (story), from Creepy 83. This story features a psychic who assists the police in catching a killer. At the same time a middle aged man picks up a teenage girl and her younger brother, who ends up being the killer. They are able to save the man before the two of them kill him.

Last is "A Martian Saga" by Berni Wrightson (art) and Nicola Cuti (story), from Creepy 87. Rather than an actual story, this is a 6 page poem, told with three panels per page. It features a man coming to Mars who meets a tribe there, confronts a monster, and meetes a beautiful woman. Alas, its not a happy ending for him as he suffocated when he takes off his oxygen mask while with the woman.

Creepy 83

This issue of Creepy is cover dated October 1976. It features the first instance in Warren history where a reprint cover was used, originally from Creepy 15. Apparantely what happened was that Richard Corben was working on a cover for his interior story "In Deep", but it didn't get finished in time, so this reprint was used instead. That cover would eventually be used for Creepy 101. Berni Wrightson provides a one page intro from Uncle Creepy.

First is "The Strange, Incurable Haunting of Phineas Boggs" by John Severin (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This story features an author who moves into a house that appears to be haunted by the ghost of an old actor, Phineas Boggs. Boggs was a star in the silent era, but the talking era forced him to because a stuntman. His ghost causes robin hood, a knight and a horseman to appear, but none end up actually harming our protagonist and it actually ends up helping the author with his work.

Next is "Process of Elimination" by Russ Heath (art) and Bruce Jones (story). A man comes home to see his family, appearing quite nervous about what he's soon going to do. After dinner, he murders his wife, then kills his two young children too. He then sleeps with a coworker of his, and kills her when she asks him too. The final page reveals why he was doing this, as a nuclear holocaust occurs. Certainly one of the biggest shock endings in Warren history, worthy enough of an entry in the Warren companion's top 25 stories list.

Third is "Country Pie" by Berni Wrightson & Carmine Infantino (art) and Bruce Jones (story). This was Infantino's first Warren story. He had been publisher over at DC, but was fired, and came here to Warren afterwards. Warren's fastest artist, he very quickly turned out a ton of stories, although it should be noted that he generally did the pencils only which is part of the reason why he finished things so fast. This story features a psychic who assists the police in catching a killer. At the same time a middle aged man picks up a teenage girl and her younger brother, who ends up being the killer. They are able to save the man before the two of them kill him.

Fourth is "In Deep" by Richard Corben (art) and Bruce Jones (story). This story tells of a husband and wife whose yacht sinks. The two of them are stranded in the water with just an inner tube to keep them afloat. Over the night the wife drowns, leaving the husband on his own. To his horror seagulls and soon sharks arrive trying to eat her corpse. He fights them off as best he can, but can't stop them all. When he's finally rescued all thats left is her heart, which he grasps tightly in his hands. An extremely good story, one of Creepy's best ever, with some extremely good color artwork.

Fifth is "Harvey Was a Sharp Cookie" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This story features an old man who loves only two things in love, the amusement park he owns and his daughter. When he refuses to sell, the prospective buyer brutally mutilates his daughter. He then tries to take over the amusement park through a quirk in the fire code law. Our protagonist decides to boobey trap the amusement park with razor blades and when the prospective buyer arrives he ends up dying because of it.

Sixth is "Now You See It..." by Al Williamson (art) and Bruce Jones (story). This story was originally intended for the Marvel science fiction magazine "Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction" but ended up appearing here instead since that magazine was cancelled. It features a man who constantly brings himself and his wife to fake prehistoric realms using a virtual reality device. She dislikes it intensely, so he brings her some place for real which still fails to convince her, and that ends up being fake too. She's happy enough with it being a fake that she finally grows warm to using the device. The main character's appearance is quite obviously based on Williamson himself.

Last is "The Last Superhero" by Carmine Infantino (art) and Cary Bates (story). This story is unique in that it was the sole story Infantino drew for Warren where there wasn't an inking job by someone else. Its kind of hard to be able to tell for sure, but I believe that this story is pencil only. It features a superhero in a society where being a superhero is illegal. Eventually he is surrounded in the sky and apparantely destroyed. Yes, Infantino was a hero expert with his experience at DC, but I question why this completely non-horror story appears here in Creepy.

Vampirella 58

A holiday themed issue of Vampirella, featuring a very good cover by Enrich. Seven stories here, a rarity for an issue from this era of Warren.

First is Vampirella in "Lenore" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). Vampirella, Pendragon and Adam arrive at a castle where a crazy old man is storing the corpse of his dead wife Lenore in a tank. The old man had gone crazy after Lenore passed away many years ago. Since then he has performed experiments, allowing him to remain alive, and also enabling his ape pet, Rocco to talk. Rocco ends up freeing Vampirella and Pendragon, but the old man transfers Adam's youth to himself. When Vampi arrives they get into a struggle and the man ends up dying after he falls into the tank with his dead wife. When he dies, his youth returns back to Adam. Rocco bids farewell to Vampi and co, choosing to go down with the castle when it collapses.

Next is this issue's first Christmas themed story, "A Matchstick Angel" by Ramon Torrents (art) and Budd Lewis (story). This story features a sick rich little boy whose set to die right around Christmas time. His only friend is a poor girl, Taddie Openshoes. When Death comes to claim him on Christmas Eve, Taddie convinces him to take her instead, and he recovers.

My number one Warren story of all time is third, "Yellow Heat" by Russ Heath (art) and Bruce Jones (story). Heath's art is some of the best to ever appear in a Warren story. This story takes place in Africa before World War I and surrounds Uthu, a young warrior in an African tribe. When a beautiful woman from an opposing tribe is captured, Uthu desires her for himself and challenges the chief when he claims her. In order to obtain her, the chief orders Uthu to accomplish a warrior's quest where he singlehandedly must kill a full grown lion with only a spear within 3 days. A near impossible task, things get even tougher for Uthu when a lion ambushes him unprepared. He gets very lucky however when a large snake attacks the lion, killing it. Uthu kills the snake and drags the lion back to his tribe, victorious. He enters the hut where the captured woman is waiting for him... and thats as far as I'm going to go. This story is memorable largely for having one of the biggest shock endings in Warren history and I'm not going to spoil it for my readers. Let me just say that the final panel is extremely horrific and startling, but ultimately makes sense within the confines of the story once you read it again. Just a fantastic, fantastic story that on its own makes this issue worth having.

Another Christmas themed story is next, "The Christmas Flower" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Budd Lewis (story). This story takes place in a poor black neighborhood where a young boy finds a flower growing out of the pavement. He views this as a miracle, but some gang members step on it soon afterwards. With the help of some women passing by, he is able to prop it up, and keep it alive. A huge crowd soon gathers around it. Later, the gang member who stepped on it swerves away from it while on a motorcycle and ends up killing himself when he hits a car.

Fifth is "The Wambaugh" by Auraleon (art) and Bruce Jones (story). A Hollywood star who just got his big break meets in the wintery Canadian wilderness with a producer friend and his wife. While there they read a story about the Wambaugh, a beast that appears in Canada taking the form of corpses that searches for a mate. The producer's wife convinces the star to kill her husband since he is finished in Hollywood. The star is too nervous to do so, so she does it herself away from him. She soon starts freaking out about seeing the Wambaugh however and when they see the corpse of her husband, the star has a heart attack and dies. It ends up all being a trick to kill him so the producer can get his role instead. But in actuality the Wambaugh has taken the producer's form and claims the wife for himself. Not a bad story, but some odd narrative lapses at time that make it seem as if captions on certain panels were left off completely.

Sixth is "Little Monster" by Carmine Infantino & Dick Giordano (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). This story features an old bus driver, Leroy, who views children as monsters. He remembers a teacher he had when he was a child who shared this opinion, who died when the 'little monsters' called her to fall out of a window. Eventually he ends up getting into an accident when his bus hits a moving train. All the kids live, but he dies.

Last is "The Sleeping Beauty" by Esteban Maroto (art) and Maroto & Bill Dubay (story). Some extremely good, exotic art by Maroto here, which appears sideways. As told in the captions, years before a prince married a beautiful peasent girl, Aurora. After their marriage she revealed to him that she had made a deal with a demon in order to be able to marry him, where she gave up both her soul and their first born son. When the son is born, the father fights off the demon. The demon instead curses the prince, taking his castle and wife, making him a peasant. The artwork shows the present day, as the son, now all grown up heads through the demon possessed castle, encountering a winged maiden, dragons and finally the demon itself, which appears as a nine headed serpent. Successfully making it past them, he comes across his mother, who remains as youthful and beautiful as she was when he was born. But upon kissing her it is revealed that she too has become a demon and kills him. A similar narrative style here to stories that Dubay wrote in 1984/1994, where the captions tell a story which isn't really seen in the artwork at all.

Creepy 89

This issue of Creepy is an all war special issue. Alas, the stories here aren't at the quality of the Blazing Combat days, which would have made this quite the issue. The cover is a reprint of Frank Frazetta's cover for Blazing Combat 1.

First is "Blood Brothers" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Bruce Jones (story). The issue's best story, it is about a soldier who meets another soldier, Voper among the dead of a destroyed fort. Voper travels with him, but constantly dissappears and appears fine after being shot by our protagonist. At the end of the story it is revealed that Voper was dead the entire time and was actually being eaten by our protagonist.

Second is "The Windmill" by Leo Duranona (art) and Lou Rossin (story). This short story, at only 5 pages, features a hunchback in the days before World War II who fights to save his country of Liechenstein from the Nazis.

Third is "Angel of Jaipur" by John Severin (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This story features a young pilot flying a plane who goes back in time and manages to save his father from a military assault. Despite there being some sceptics, the gun marks on his plane are proof enough that it really happened.

Fourth is "The Hungry Dragon" by Carmine Infantino & Alex Nino (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). A soldier comes across a village in Vietnam where he finds some young children which he attempts to care for. He heads out and kills some enemy soldiers to find food for them, but upon returning finds them eating the remains of some dead soldiers, causing them to kill them... in his mind. In actuality, he only harmed one of them, who ended up becoming his wife years later, but in his mind he is convinced he killed them all.

Fifth is "The Door-Gunner" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Larry Hama & Cary Bates (story). This story is drawn in pencil only. It features a veteran back from Vietnam who is convinced that he is still there at the war, resulting in murderous rages from him. In the end it ends up that he's in a mental hospital.

Last is "Coggin's Army" by Martin Salvador (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). Similar to the last story, this story takes place in an institution, where an old general, his wheelchair bound friend and others are convinced they are still at war.

Creepy 129

Jeff Easely provides the cover for this issue of Creepy. Rudy Nebres draws a one page intro from Uncle Creepy. Like most issues from this period, a boring issue with nothing much here to impress the reader.

First is "The Terrible Truth About Danny" by Martin Salvador (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This story tells of a young boy with pyschokenetic powers who can cause objects to do whatever he wants to get revenge on anyone whose done him wrong. A beautiful girl moves in next door but unlike other boys doesn't like her. One night he decides to force himself on her to be like everyone else but instead decides to kill himself by blowing his own head up.

Second is "The Saga of Popeye Jackson!" by Paul Neary (art) and Gerry Boudreau (story). This story tells of a revolution from a robot man who used to be human. Some pretty good art from Neary, but a poor, rather dull story.

Third is "Working Class Hero" by Carmine Infantino & Alfredo Alcala (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). This story features an accountant in his forties who looks much older than that who is bored with life, but is suddenly transported to thousands of years in the past where he helps a woman who escaped from her slave master. They go meet with a wizard, the man who brought him back in time by accident and they defeat the slave master. The wizard tries to transport him back to the present, but he ends up in the revolutionary war period instead. Some good art, but a poor, pointless story.

Fourth is "The Last Voyage of Sinbad" by Fred Carillo (art) and Budd Lewis (story). The Sinbad of legend is actually a dim-witted man who desires more than anything else to have friends and have the rain stop. Some treasurer hunters recruit him to join them and when they find how dumb he is they instead plan to have him be the fall guy when they discover a genie that will kill whoever summons him. The genie instead grants Sinbad's wishes to have friends and stop the rain.

Fifth is "He Who Lives!" by Danny Bulandi (art) and Budd Lewis (story). A confusing story about a man on a spaceship who goes down to a planet, sees weird visions, and encounters a vampire who he kills, making him a vampire himself.

Last is "Strategic Retreat" by Herb Arnold (art) and John Ellis Sech (story). This story features a humanoid dinosaur who hires soldiers to kill his old men and help him escape. While escaping however the soldiers sign a new contract with his enemy, giving him only two weeks to live.

Vampirella 59

Enrich provides a rather comedic cover to this issue of Vampirella.

First is "Pendragon's Last Bow" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Bill Dubay (story). Vampi and Pendragon come to a new town where some murders have been taking place. Pendragon meets a beautiful woman Rosie, the owner of an antique shop directly above the place where the corpses have been found. The Van Helsings arrive and find that Rosie is a succubus, who along with her brother is responsible for the murders. Rosie and her brother are killed, but she saves Adam, who had been attacked by her brother before she dies.

Second is "Changes" by Leo Duranona (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). This story features a man released from a mental institution who wonders around where he used to live, but everything has changed. A rather weak story

Third is "Funeral Day" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). This story surrounds a funeral director in a post apocalyptic society where people eat the corpse. Another so-so story at best.

Fourth is "Force Feed" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Cary Bates (story). A killer who is on the run from the police finds a scientist who is able to transport him to someone else's body in another time. He proves it by letting him tempoorarily be in Jack the Ripper. But when they go ahead with transporting him to someone else's body, the scientist, knowing the killer is a vegitarian, has him turned into a Tyranosaurus Rex. The best story of this issue.

Fifth is "The Plot's the Thing" by Martin Salvador (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). A comic book story writer who is an expert at horrific stories decides to inspire himself by killing people. Eventually he kills his wife, then kills his neighbor when he discovers him trying to escape with the body. He drags the bodies to throw over a bridge where he is killed by another man, who just happens to be killing him to inspire himself for his first comic book story.

Last is "The Beast is Yet to Come" by Carmine Infantino & Alex Nino (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). This story features a man on the planet Rego living there with his son. The aliens there tell him of a creature, the "Wilwulf" which he doesn't believe in. After fighting some other aliens on the planet however, he returns home to find that his son is the Wilwulf.

Vampirella 62

Enrich provides the cover for this issue of Vampirella.

First is "Starpatch, Quark & Mother Blitz" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This story continues from the previous issue's story, where Vampirella had her eyes stolen by the Blood Red Queen of Hearts. Suddenly a group of aliens arrive, those listed in the title, and save her, giving her her eyes back. They also restore Pendragon's heart, which had been stolen by the Queen.

Next is "U.F.O." by Ramon Torrents (art) and Josep Toutain (story). Toutain was the head of Seleciones Illustrada, the art agency that managed the majority of the spanish artists that worked for Warren. This story was meant to appear in the magazine "Yesterday, Today... Tomorrow" but since that magazine was never published, it ended up here. This story is about a man who searches for U.F.O.s with a newspaper reporter and finds them in a winter landscape. They go to the Air Force, which doesn't believe them, discreding them. In the epilogue it ends up that the aliens are real, as they attack humanity.

Third is "Beautiful Screamer" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Bruce Jones (story). Some very nice art by Sanchez on this story. It features a handyman and a maid who are after an old man's money, trying to get put in his will. They convince him to do so by tricking him into thinking he's dreaming when he actually is drugged. When it is revealed that the old man has a nephew, they rush to poison him before they are removed from the will. The handyman however only dreams that he switched the old man's wine with poison, and both him and the maid end up drinking the poison by mistake instead of the old man.

Fourth is "Time Ticket" by Esteban Maroto (art) and Gerry Boudreau (story). This story features a sorceress who is able to grant anyone's wish as long as they give her 7 minutes of her life. Multiple people in this story ask her for the wish, but each time disastrous results happen. An interesting concept, although not the strongest ending.

Fifth is "Fog" by Carmine Infantino & Dick Giordano (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). This story features a dangerous fog that chases a couple. They are able to escape from it, but it adapts by turning into a liquid, and getting at them that way.

Last is "By Treason's Knife", written by Gerry Boudreau. While the art is credited to Leopold Sanchez, this art looks to me to be done by Jose Ortiz. The story takes place in World War 2, where a soldier is recruited by his commanding officer to go on a secret mission to kill Rommel, getting close to him by betraying his allies. He betrays his allies, but the commanding officer set him up, as the gun he's been given has no bullets and he fails to kill Rommel, dying instead.

Vampirella 60

This issue of Vampirella starts off with a cover by Enrich, featuring the Blood Red Queen of Hearts versus Vampirella.

First up is "The Return of the Blood Red Queen of Hearts" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Bill Dubay (story). The Blood Red Queen of Hearts, who lost her eyes to a demon in her first appearance (issue 49) tries once again to gather hearts so she can become Chaos's bride. She also seeks revenge on Vampirella by taking her eyes from her. Pendragon meanwhile meets a beautiful woman who steals his book on Chaos from him after knocking him out.

Second is "He Who Laughs Last... Laughs Best" by Carmine Infantino & Gonzalo Mayo (art) and Bruce Jones (story). Two men who are very competitive with playing practical jokes on one another are given money by an old man in a club they are a part of the more over the top their joke is. One of the men gets the other to kill himself after he is caused to believe that he caused a woman he is with to be hit by a car. But his death is faked, as she was working with him all along.

Third is "Riding Shotgun" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Gerry Boudreau (story). A trucker encounters a very beautiful young woman, 'Shotgun' at a truck stop. It is soon revealed that she is a succubus, as she preys on two other truckers while sleeping with them. Knowing full well who she is, our protagonist sleeps with her, but avoids kissing her and is able to keep himself alive. Some very attractive art by Bermejo here; Shotgun is probably the most beautiful woman in any of his Warren stories.

Fourth is "Wish You Were Here" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Bill Dubay (story). A pair of old men who used to write sci-fi stories long for the old days where they had been transported to another planet by a transportation beam used by a beautiful alien woman. Now old, they are unable to go there due to pollution in the sky. One of the men is about to kill himself, but is at that moment transported back to the alien world, presumably for good. Not a bad story, but with so much good stuff around it, the clear low point of the issue.

The issue concludes with "Fallen Angels" by Esteban Maroto (art) and Bill Dubay (story). The art for this story is sideways. Some very good, exotic art from Maroto on this story, which comes off as a Warren version of the Little Mermaid. A mermaid princess lives in an ocean paradise. She rescues a human man from a shipwreck and falls in love with him. She begs her father, who always taught her that humans were evil, to turn her into a human so she can be with him and he reluctantly permits it. She reunites with the man who treats her kindly at first, but she soon finds him with another woman. Realizing that men are evil, as her father taught her, she tries to return to the sea, but now a human, she drowns.

Creepy 87

This issue is a special issue dedicated to the planet Mars. Nicola Cuti is credited as an editor (below Louise Jones and Bill Dubay) for this issue only. The cover is by Berni Wrightson; it is not an original cover but rather colored reprinted panels from art he did within the magazine. Wrightson was reportedly rather upset when he found Warren had done this; its a practice they used occasionally throughout the years, although mostly on reprint issues such as Creepy 82 and Eerie 78. An excellent issue, with only one poor story.

First is a one page feature titled "Four Classic Martians", drawn by Berni Wrightson. It features four panels of various martians. Two of these panels would be used on the cover.

Next is "A Warped Tale" by Gray Morrow (art) and Al Sirois (story). This was Morrow's first Warren appearance since the cover of Eerie 10 in 1967, and his first interior story since Creepy 10 in 1966. Unfortunately it would also be his final Warren appearance. The story features two astronauts who end up going through a timewarp, and find themselves on Mars, thousands of years ago. Mars at this time is a beautiful planet, very similar to Earth. From two of its inhabitants who they meet, they find that Mars is battling a planet that exists between Mars and Jupiter. The aliens from that planet can't breathe on Mars, and vice versa. Eventually these aliens attack, pumping their atmosphere into Mars. When our heroes retaliate, its sets the entire planet on fire. The enemy's planet is destroyed, creating, the asteroid belt that exists today. A very interesting and well drawn story to start the issue.

Third is "A Martian Saga" by Berni Wrightson (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). Rather than an actual story, this is a 6 page poem, told with three panels per page. It features a man coming to Mars who meets a tribe there, confronts a monster, and meets a beautiful woman. Alas, its not a happy ending for him as he suffocated when he takes off his oxygen mask while with the woman.

Fourth is "Those 'Orrible Passions of '78" by Carmine Infantino & Dick Giordano (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This issue's best story, it features a retiring detective being interviewed about the most mysterious case of his career. It involved multiple events occuring within a short period of time where parents murdered their children, then died themselves shortly after. At the same time an old man off in the wilderness just lied down in his yard during a snowstorm and died. Throughout the story we are shown similar events occuring on Mars involving a martian and its dead children. The detective wonders if the death of an alien race somewhere in the universe occuring at the same time as these murders influenced them in some way. As an epilogue we are shown the mysterious face on Mars. A very interesting story.

Fifth is "The Last" by John Severin (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). This story features a humanoid Martin who lives on Mars all alone with a robot. The martian is very depressed over the fact that the humans that used to be there are now all dead. The robot starts playing a movie for him, but the martian, trying to get him to stop, electrocutes himself. Ironically, the movie reveals that he wasn't a martian at all, but a mutated human, effected by radiation from the war on Earth that forced humanity to flee to Mars. All alone, the robot kills himself.

Sixth is "They Come Out at Night" by Martin Salvador (art) and Bruce Jones (story). Some astronauts arrive at Mars and find a prior expedition wiped out, with just corpses there. The story then flashes back to the past where one of the astronauts arrives at Mars, finding that his wife is sleeping with another man. When learning of her infidelity he tries to leave her, but it ends up that she is actually possessed by roach like creatures who infect the other crew members when she kisses them. He kills her, but her corpse still comes after him as its still possessed by the roaches. In the present time, our protagonists are confronted by her corpse, which is still possessed by them!

Last is "Warmonger of Mars" by Ralph Reese (art) and Wally Wood (story). This story was reportedly created a long time before this issue, but not printed until now. The issue's sole poor story, it is a comedic effort featuring a man and creature on Mars. Yawn. Reese's art appears heavily inspired by Wood here.

Creepy 90

Enrich provides the cover for this issue of Creepy, one of his few Creepy covers.

First is "Warrior on the Edge of Forever" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This story was originally intended for the war special of the prior issue. Its about a man who has dreams of prior lives as a soldier in important wars and conflicts. This story features photos of Warren production assistant Bill Mohalley as a dictator.

Second is "The Wash Out" by Leo Duranona (art) and Bruce Jones (story). A man and an android head out to a planet to find a woman. The man has a lot of disrespect for the android, although they do end up having sex with each other. Eventually they find the woman, who ends up being an android trying to pose as a human, and she's killed by them. Our protagonist ends up being an android after all, the android companion was actually a human all along, and he ends up shorting out his circuits when he drinks some coffee.

Third is "The Search" by Carmine Infantino & Gonzalo Mayo (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). This story is about a town's search for a vampire that has been killing many of its occupants. The story is told from a person who lost his lover to a vampire. It ends up that our narrator is the vampire, and he ends up getting killed by his own father.

Fourth is "Please... Save the Children" by Martin Salvador (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This story tells of a child killer whose daughter ended up dying after she ran away after being spanked. This causes him to go out and start killing children of parents who he perceives as treating them badly. Even though his father is the President of the US, this doesn't stop the prison from executing him.

Fifth is "The Sacrifice" by Auraleon (art) and Jose Toutain (story). This story tells of a tribe which feels the need to sacrifice its most beautiful virgin each year to its God. Even though the sacrifice this time is the chief's daughter, they go ahead with it anyway. The God they worship ends up being a giant computer. A short story at only four pages long.

Last is "Dollie" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). This story was originally intended for the previous Christmas special. It features children being given horrific gifts by Santa Claus that cause havoc, such as a rifle that a boy uses to shoot his parents, not knowing it was real and a chemistry set that blows up the entire house. Another girl is given a doll that acts like a vampire. When the mother tears off its head, her daughter's head falls off. It ends up that it isn't Santa, but rather Satan that is giving out these gifts.

Eerie 96

Jordi Penalva provides the cover for this issue, which features Mac Tavish. This issue is a rarity in that there is no Rook story, most likely due to the fact that the next Rook story was over 30 pages long and took a while to put together.

Up first is "Fallen Angels", three stories by Leo Duranona (art) and Guillermo Saccomano & Cary Bates (story). Given Saccomano's credit here (he was not a regular Warren writer), and the fact that the artwork is dated 1976, one would think that this story was originally printed elsewhere and reprinted here. These stories feature four humanoid characters, Hot Chocolate, Knuckle, Marlene and Toc Toc who were cast out of Heaven and forced to do penance on Earth. They each take the appearance of street dwellers. In the first story, "Revenge", they go after a pimp who has been mistreating his whores. The second story, "The Cutman" features an old assassin who is hired to perform a hit, but he screws up and kills the wrong person, forcing the person who hired him, his own son, to kill him. The final story, "Explosive Issue" is about a pair of crooks who arrange to blow up a building for the insurance money. The Fallen Angels get involved and turn to violence, resulting in criticism from their superior. They work to get the head of the whole scam to end up getting himself killed by running into an exploding building. All three stories are fairly good, with some very good art, as usual from Duranona. Unfortunate that no further stories would ever appear.

Next is "Hero of Zodiac V" by Pepe Moreno Casares (art) and Jim Stenstrum (story, as Alabaster Redzone). This story coninues immediately after the last story. Mac Tavish meets with Ida Lizer, a robot lover, then goes to see Spider Andromeda who reveals that Lazard works with Gorgo the Man, a leading candidate for governor on Rara Avis. It is also revealed that they are after Rara Avis due to a raw material there that permits people to live forever. Mac Tavish and Spider lead an attack on a planet breaker factory.

Next is "The Ark" by Carmine Infantino & Walt Simonson (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). In this story an old man builds an ark, causing the rest of the townfolk to ridicule him. He ends up being right though, as rain soon comes. He and his wife hide in the ark and the rest of the town get angry at him for not letting them in. He is killed by the townsfolk when he comes out and they storm in to the ark, where they are trapped, and the rain stops soon after.

Last is "The Shining Sea" by Alfredo Alcala (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). This odd story features a man living in a water filled world where the other people are humanoid except for their dolphin (or other sea creature) faces. He goes searching for his origin, which appears to be from a spaceship that crashed on this world. Another story in this series appeared a few issues later.

Creepy 98

The cover for this issue is by Atilla Heije. This is an all media horror issue.
First is "The Alien Factor" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Budd Lewis (story). This story is about some reporters investigating an alien presence. They face some people trying to cover things up, and government forces evenutally arrive and investigate, telling everyone that the presense was nothing more than fungus.

Second is "Helen Horror Hollywood" by Leo Duranona (art) and Gerry Boudreau (story). This story tells the tale of a girl who was interested in nothing but movies growing up, who eventually went to Hollywood and became famous. The theatre she stayed in however housed a monster that killed a former lover of hers, and eventually her as well when she returns to it.

Third is "Graveyard Shift" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Bruce Jones (story). This story features a radio DJ on the graveyard shift who receives threatening calls from a man who tried to kill him and his fiance. His fiance is attacked and the DJ finds that it is actually his enemy's brother, as his enemy died in prison. Luckily, the attacker is electocuted when he steps in a puddle, saving our protagonist.

Fourth is "Starlet, Starlet, Burning Bright" by Carmine Infantino & Dick Giordano (art, miscredited to Ramon Torrents) and Gerry Boudreau (story). The issue's best story, this is about a woman who meets a former soldier who starts stalking her. He is the son of a famous man in Hollywood, so she is unable to do anything about him. She recruits an old lover to help him, but when the stalker tries to blow him up, she ends up dying instead.

Last is "The Image Makers" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). This story is about a pair of men working on a device that projects a person's image. They try to get money for it by swindling an old woman, convincing her through a seance that her dead daughter has come back to life. They do this by getting a friend of there's who looks like the dead daughter to pretend to be her. One of the men wants her to kill the old woman because she'll inherit the money, but instead he is done in when someone projects a bridge to appear over a gap. It ends up being set up by the old woman, who knew of their scheme all along, having been the funder for their device.

Eerie 95

Vampirella guest stars with the Rook on the cover of this issue, the first Eerie issue featuring the Rook on the cover in quite a while. The cover is painted by Jordi Penalva, one of S.I.'s artists who was pretty good, but not at the level of Sanjulian and Enrich, the two main spanish cover artists for Warren.

First is "Warriors from the Stars" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Bill Dubay (story). In this story Vampi, the Rook and the others arrive back in time, finding the aliens that originally brought the annihilator here. They are fighting other aliens, and our heroes help them. After the battle, the aliens give them a key enabling them to stop the annihilator and any other ones around the world when they return.

Second is "Willie's Super-Magic Basketball" by Carmine Infantino & Rudy Nebres (art) and Jim Stenstrum (story). Infantino's contributions appear barely at all here in the final product, one may think Nebres did this alone if it wasn't for the credits. The story is about a boy with a magic basketball that allows him to be good at basketball. The boy later goes to Vietnam, returning after his mother's death. Hooked on drugs, he runs from the cops and a drug dealer and his magic basketball turns him back into a kid, allowing him to escape them.

Third is "Faster Than a Speeding Whozit", the latest story in the Abelmar Jones series. Art is by Alex Nino and story is by Bill Dubay. Abelmar and his brother get into another adventure, looking for a superman in the city, but instead finding a powerful robot. Another very lame story, with some okay art from Nino. This series would conclude in Creepy 128, which came out a number of years after this issue.

Fourth is this issue's color feature, "Nuts!" by Pablo Marcos (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). Alfredo Alcala also appears on the credit line, but he doesn't appear to have had any input in the artwork for this story, and doesn't appear on the contents page (this was probably a misprint). This story features a pilot transporting a whole army, which has been dehydrated in order to hide themselves. Most of the story is quite lame, with various space action, and our protagonist eating a lot of nuts. The story does have a pretty good ending though, when it is revealed that the nuts he was eating are actually the brains of the soldiers he was transporting! Marcos's art is rather poor here, wasting a color story which would have worked better on many other artists.

Fifth is "Harrow House" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Bruce Jones (story). This is the first of a two part story, concluded in issue 99. This is a very good story, featuring an old woman seeking to sell a house of her's that is haunted with the ghost of her dead niece. Multiple people have tried to stay in it, but all went crazy. The man occupies the house where mysterious things start to occur. He does manage to make it out okay though. He returns to the house where he sees a spectral form of the niece on teh stairs, which is where this part ends.

Last is a new series, Mac Tavish, in "Caucus on Rara Avis" by Pepe Moreno Casares (art) and Jim Stenstrum (story, as Alabaster Redzone). This new series, which lasted in Eerie for quite a while, is very clearly heavily influenced by Star Wars. It stars Mac Tavish, a space hero, who is brought to Rara Avis to speak on behalf of the Governor, who is running for re-election. The governor is assassinated, and Mac Tavish pursues the assassin and kills him, who ends up being a robot. The murder is suspected to be done by a terrorist, Spider Andromeda, who is actually Mac Tavish's friend. Spider, who looks like a lion man shows up, and refutes that, suggesting Mac Tavish run for governor. While this has some good art, there's nothing here special storywise in this first part of a long series.

Eerie 84

This issue of Eerie features a reprinted cover by Frank Frazetta originally used for issue 8. This was the first ever reprint cover for Eerie, which would become quite common over the next few years.

First up is the latest Rook story, "Yesterday, the Final Day" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Bill Dubay (story). The Rook, after bringing his great great grandfather Bishop Dane to the present (which originally happened in the first Rook story) goes back in time to get his revenge on Gat Hawkins. Gat Hawkins gets the better of him however, shooting him and leaving him for dead. Luckily the Rook isn't dead, and is nursed back to health by Kate, introduced in the prior story, and her friend Jan. Jan manages to sneak into Hawkin's home and make it to the Rook's Time Castle and bring it back to the present. Bishop Dane then heads back into the past and helps the Rook get revenge on Hawkins. Heavily injured, the two are nursed back to health by Kate and Jan, who decide to come to the present themselves for good. The best of the Rook stories so far, with Bermejo's art also quite good on this story.

Second is "Brass Monkey", the latest Hard John Apple story by Jose Ortiz (art) and Jim Stenstrum (story). Ortiz uses a new art style in this story, which results in his art looking a lot like Alfredo Alcala's. John and Tarara go to a Catlick base in order to get plans to assist in John's attack on the world. There it is discovered that Zinger, the man who originally told John about the nukes in Kansas is a member of the Catlicks, Protstnts and Tarara's group. He plans to finish off our heroes, but the General (the orangutan introduced in the prior part) arrives and helps our heroes escape.

Third is a sequel to issue 68's Godeye, "Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road" by Carmine Infantino & Dan Green (art) and Budd Lewis (story). I wonder why they didn't use Leopold Sanchez for this story, the artist for the original story, as he was at Warren at this time. Godeye is recruited to be a hero again, this time on the world Elton where he is there to rescue a princess from the Rhode, a large sphere which is controlled by a powerful giant. Godeye outsmarts the giant by challenging him to a digging contest, which is filled with water due to hitting a well. Godeye then manages to drown the giant by throwing a rope around his neck and dragging him into the water. His reward is the Rhode itself, which is made out of gold. This story would be Godeye's final appearance.

Last is "He Who Waits in Shadow" by Jim Starlin (story & art). This is a very surrealistic 6 page story that features Darklon making a guest appearance on the final page.

Eerie 83

Another cover featuring the Rook starts off this issue, painted by Enrich, a rare Eerie cover for him.

First is the Rook in "The Day Before Tomorrow" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Bill Dubay (story). The Rook accidently brings the outlaw Gat Hawkins with him from the 1830's to the 1870's, where he is forced to chase after a bird that steals part of his time machine. The bird leads him underground where he finds a robot and a lab he can use for himself. Hawkins meanwhile plots to both steal the Rook's time machine and destroy his grandfather Bishop Dane as well through a woman, Kate McCall that ends up double crossing him when she turns out liking Dane. The Rook manages to rescue his grandfather despite the attacks from Hawkins. A somewhat better part than the last Rook story, although you would think that all of the Rook's tampering with history would really screw things up.

Second is Hard John's Nuclear Hit Parade, with the story "Kansas City Bomber". Art is by Jose Ortiz and story is by Jim Stenstrum. Hard John Apple is a character that was originally introduced in Creepy 64 in the story "An Angel Shy of Hell", the very first issue I covered on this blog. For those who haven't caught that original story, this story takes place in the post-apocalyptic future where 'Catlicks' and 'Protstnts' fight each other. Hard John Apple has fooled the Prot leaders into giving him the state of Kansas, which is filled with nuclear weapons which he plans to use with the help of an orangutan. This story introduces Tarara, a woman who captures John and discovers his plans.

Third is another new series, Gaffer in "Temptation" by Leo Duranona (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). This was a very good four part series that was spread out over a number of issues. Gaffer is a poor old black man who befriends a young boy, Jaime. They go to a carnival where Gaffer is quite successful at a wheel of chance, resulting in the carnival barker inviting him to another event at midnight. There it is revealed that the barker is actually the devil himself. The Gaffer continues to lose against him until he bets Jaime's soul, and manages to win, which results in him getting three wishes.

Last is "Presto the Besto" by Carmine Infantino & Dick Giordano (art) and Jim Stenstrum (story). Presto is a famous escape artist who manages to escape from many near deaths. His latest however appears to be his last as he's bandaged up, tied up and put in a chained case that is filled with cement and dumped into a body of water. While he dies from this, no one aside from his family believes he's actually dead given his past.

Vampirella 61

Enrich provides the cover for this issue of Vampirella.

First is "An Eye for an Eye" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Bill Dubay (story). Vampi is captured by the Blood Red Queen of Hearts, whose eyes were torn out by a demon back in her first appearance in issue 49 (which I've yet to cover on this blog). The Queen of Hearts steals Vampi's eyes, hoping to replace her own with them. At the same time she sends a demon off to steal Pendragon's heart. Unfortunately for her, the interference by a seemingly innocent couple that finds a book of chaos causes a demon to come and attack her. Vampi escapes, but without her eyes is quite helpless.

Second is "Skimpole's Monster" by Ramon Torrents (art) and Bill Dubay (story). This story tells of a friendly old puppet maker whose puppets are able to talk due to him. Behind his back his wife starts having an affair with a doctor because he doesn't pay enough attention to her. When she tells him he has a heart attack and dies, causing all his puppets to die as well.

Third is "Brother Hawk" by Carmine Infantino & Alex Nino (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). This story is about a pair of brothers, one of whom is able to transform into a hawk. He meets a beautiful woman and falls in love with her. She is soon attacked by a bear however, so he attacks the bear and manages to kill it while in his hawk form. The bear ends up being his brother, who was able to transform as well.

Fourth is "The Enhanting Fable of Thistlewhite the Bold" by Russ Heath (art) and Bill Dubay (story). Thistlewhite's wife is captured by a knight, who demand ransom for her. Thistlewhite heads off with his short friend, Chippin the Bold. Along the way they are able to very easily defeat the monsters attacking them. It ends up that Thistlewhite's wife is so annoying that the knight wants to give her back, but Thistlewhite decides against it and returns home, to enjoy a better life without her.

Last is "Companions to the Sun" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Bruce Jones (story). A man piloting a plane crashes in the Arizona desert when he encounters a UFO. All he has from the wreckage is a bottle of cleaner, which he empties to hold water in and a bottle of rat poison. He finds the crashed UFO and rescues the alien inside, who looks like a walking frog man. He wanders through the desert with the alien, surviving mostly due to the alien's ability to find water and cook food. The alien gives him a pill each night which causes the man to have a dream of a beautiful woman. He eventually becomes hooked on the pills. When they finally reach society, the alien is killed by some people who think he's attacking the man. Our protagonist grabs the alien's last pill, but ends up mistakenly drinking the rat poison to help swallow it, which ends up killing him.

Eerie 82

Issue 81 of Eerie contains no continuing stories that impact other issues, so I'll be skipping that issue for now and going straight to issue 82. This issue's cover highlights Eerie's new main recurring character, the Rook, in a cover by Bill Dubay (the character's creator) and Luis Bermejo. The Rook begins a new era in Eerie, as a continuing open ended series with more of a traditional hero, with this character appearing in every non-reprint issue of Eerie for the next 30 issues or so until the character got its own magazine. This makes Eerie similar in format to Vampirella for a while, with a long opening story featuring the magazine's main hero, and the remainder of the issue filled with backup stories. Unfortunately the Rook's stories were generally at the same quality as Vampirella, meaning that while there was the occasional good story, most were average at best. And while Vampirella could for the most part always boast tremendous artwork from Jose Gonzalez or Gonzalo Mayo, the Rook was drawn by Luis Bermejo, who at this point in his career started to slowly decline in quality, most likely because of his task of drawing a large Rook story in each issue. Anyway, let's get on to the stories.

First is The Rook in "The Man Who Time Forgot!" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Bill Dubay (story). The Rook, whose name is Restin Dane, is a physicist who has created a time machine in the shape of a giant rook chess piece. The Rook goes back in time to the old west where he rescues his Great Grandfather, Dane and brings him back to the present. In the present the confused Dane meets Manners, the tin man assistant to the Rook and his other various robots. The Rook meanwhile goes back into the past where he attempts to save his great great grandfather from death at the alamo but fails, being only able to save a single boy.

Second is "And Now the Game is Afoot" the final story in the Tombspawn series. Art is by Carmine Infantino & Gonzalo Mayo and story is by Gerry Boudreau. Steve and Biff battle the Russians but are tricked by many holograms and delusions from them. Eventually Biff is killed by a monster that Steve destroys. The series ends here, unresolved.

Third is "Castle of the Assassin", the second Scallywag story, with art by Jose Ortiz and story is by Budd Lewis. Sullivan heads off to battle the samurai who stole a statue from him and killed some of his women. He battles the samurai and manages to defeat him, but the samurai ends up being his friend Konishi.

Last is "In a Deep Sea Tomb", the latest story in the Pea Green Boat series. Art is by Leopold Sanchez and story is by Budd Lewis. Al and Eric head underwater where they find a sunk nazi ship. They come across some pirates who capture them, desiring food. They manage to escape from the pirates and destroy their ship. A rather boring entry this time, with much of the captions written in cursive, which is very hard to read.

Eerie 80

A Sanjulian cover featuring Tombspawn leads off this issue of Eerie.

First is "The Invisible One", the first of a new series, Scallywag. Art is by Jose Ortiz and story is by Budd Lewis. An old American man in Japan, Sullivan is attacked by Samurais but easily defeats him. He befriends a friendly samurai, Konishi, who goes with him to his ship, where he lives with a number of women. That night the women are killed by ninjas. A so-so start to this new series.

Second is "Retribution", the latest Darklon story. Story and art are by Jim Starlin. This story continues the origin of Darklon from the previous story. After having been decapitated by the nameless one's minions, Darklon is brought back to life with great power that comes from his eye. Darklon easily kills Blacklore and frees his father.

Third is "On Moonlight Bay", the second Pea Green Boat story. Art is by Leopold Sanchez and story is by Budd Lewis. Eric and Al sail across the sea in their boat and come across a harbor where they are fired upon, by people who think they are instead a monster that kidnapped babies. Al and Green head to the boat where the captured kids were, finding out that a radiation burned cannibal had been capturing the children and eating them, having gone mad from his burns.

Fourth is "Pieces of Hate", the next story in the Tombspawn series (originally titled Day of the Vampire in issue 73). Gonzalo Mayo once again provides the art while Gerry Boudreau provides the story. Our heroes can kill whoever they want to satisfy their thirst for blood but are concerned about creating too many vampires that will be competition for them. Meanwhile Russians in a space shuttle head down to the surface and reveal that they were responsible for the war that ruined the world. Our heroes and the Russians decide to hunt for each other to determine who will control the Earth in its current state.

Fifth is the second and final story of the "Third Person Singular" storyline. Art is by Luis Bermejo and story is by Bruce Jones. Our hero encounters the women from the previous part and she brings him to a society of women only. The government raids their society, so the two of them escape.

The issue concludes with "Queen of the Purple Range", the second Cronk story. Art is by Carmine Infantino & Al Milgrom and story is by Nicola Cuti. Cronk is responsible for transporting a group of eggs, one of which cracks open, revealing a spotted women who immediately destroys all the other ones. She is actually the new queen of the planet Gagoian. She battles the sole survivor from the eggs and Cronk brings her to her planet where they won't accept her.