Monday, March 30, 2009

Creepy 55


An all reprint issue of Creepy, the cover being a montage of many previous covers. This issue is dated August 1973.

First is "Brain Trust" by Angelo Torres (art) and Archie Goodwin (story), from Creepy 10. A new doctor in town is perplexed by the town eccentric, a large man who doesn't show up in public often, and smells like shaving cream. Eventually the grocery store owner refuses his business and he dissappears. The doctor finds out that the man was one of a set of mutated twins. Having died in a car crash, his other brother used his brain to control his actions. When the doctorcomes upon him, the living twin uses the dead one's body to kill himself.

Second is "Welcome Stranger" by Al Williamson (art) and Archie Goodwin (story), from Creepy 2. Two men from Hollywood that work in the movie industry come across a town where they find some strange events occuring. They soon encounter some ghosts. It ends up all being fake, an act by the townfolk who want a movie filmed there, but their work had resulted in frightening the two men to death

Third is "Act Three", which is written and drawn by Johnny Craig. This story, from Creepy 18 is about an actress whose husband has turned into a werewolf. The two of them are able to get a doctor to create a cure, but when he injects both of them with the serum, the actress turns into a werewolf herself.

Fourth is "Thundering Terror!" by John Severin (art) and Clark Dimond & Terry Bisson (story), from Creepy 17. This issue was clearly originally intended for Eerie, with Cousin Eerie hosting it. This story is about an old man who tells of his brother, who was obsessed with killing buffalos. One such encounter resulted in the death of a man who was trying to stop him. Over the years our narrator becomes successful and grows a family while his brother vanishes and returns from time to time, always doing nothing but hunting buffalos. An old man, our narrator finds his brother dead after he tries to hunt one last buffalo, and sees the ghost of the dead man on a ledge above him. Like any story told in a western setting, Severin was perfectly suited for this story.

Fifth is "Incident in the Beyond!" by Gray Morrow (art) and Archie Goodwin (story), from Creepy 3. A ship heads through space, testing a new warp drive to ensure it works. There was one prior try at the warp, which failed before. Along the way they find an apparent alien ship, which they destroy. The warp drive works, but they find that it has not saved them any time, and they find another ship trying the drive thinking they're aliens, so they are destroyed as well, like they had destroyed the original ship.

Sixth is "Prelude to Armageddon" by Wally Wood (art) and Wally Wood & Nicola Cuti (story) from Creepy 41. Some very sexy art by Wood in this story about a medieval war between various creatures such as centaurs, minotaurs and other creatures. The moon explodes during the battle, dealing heavy damage to the Earth and wiping out the battlers, leading to our society many milleniums later.

Last is "The Law and Disorder" by Luis Garcia (art) and Dennis P. Junot (story), from Creepy 47. This story features a man who is angry at the board of trustees of a college, thinking they are responsible for his father's death. He creates a disintegration ray which he lets into their hands, and they die of radiation once using it. The protagonist then dies suddenly at the end of the story, with little explanation.

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