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.

Eerie 79

A football themed cover by Ken Kelly on this issue of Eerie.

First is "Time and Time Again" by Richard Corben (art) and Bruce Jones (story), a continuation of the "Within You Without You" story from Eerie 77. Karen is requested to go back in time to retrieve a gun that had been left behind. While there she seeks revenge on the Tyranosaurus that killed Lydecker. She gets her timing mixed up however, and ends up killing the dinosaur before it killed him, so she encounters the past version of him and herself. The scientists bring her out of it, but Lydecker ends up occupying her mind when they do that.

Second is "The Pea-Green Boat", a new series from Leopold Sanchez (art) and Budd Lewis (story). Two men work on a boat, which they paint Pea Green. Eventually the apocalypse occurs and the two escape to the ocean on the boat, fighting off anyone who tries to come aboard.

Third is the second Darklon story, "The Price" by Jim Starlin (story & art). This story tells of Darklon's origin, how his father disliked him because of his peaceful nature. His father finds a new 'son' that Darlon reveals is going to betray him. Darklon goes to see the mysterious 'nameless one' who agrees to give him power, but does so by chopping off his head, killing him. An interesting origin for this Warren superhero.

Fourth is "Third Person Singular" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Bruce Jones (story), the first of two part story. An odd story that takes place in a world where everyone (well almost everyone) is a male homosexual. The hero of our story is one of the very few heterosexuals in the world, who are under seige by caped agents called Snuffers. At the end of our story a snuffer raid is stopped by our hero, who discovers the snuffer to be a woman.

Last is "Sam's Son and Delilah" by Carmine Infantino & Al Milgrom (art) and Bruce Jones (story). The story tells of a boy, Bubber who is born deaf and mute. He becomes quite good at painting and playing football. His career continues at his father's urging even though he'd rather paint. He is so famous that a stadium is built for him. Eventually however a tumor that his father ignored causes him to go crazy. At a commemorative event for him he ends up destroying the entire stadium, killing himself and his father.

Eerie 53

A very good all series issue of Eerie. The cover features the Mummy, by Sanjulian. The frontis for this issue is a two page feature, "Wart Monster of Tennessee" by Bill Dubay & Rich Buckler (art) and Doug Moench (story).

Up first is this issue's segment of The Mummy Walks, "Enter Mr. Hyde" by Jaime Brocal (art) and Steve Skeates (story). Jerome Curry, in the body of the mummy continues to pursue the woman who holds the amulet that can return him to his human form. During this story he encounters Mr. Hyde, a beast like man who has transformed from a normal human. The mummy defeats him and continues on his way.

Next is "To Save a Witch's Soul", part of the Curse of the Werewolf series, with art by Martin Salvador (art) and Al Milgrom (story). With his memories restored, Arthur Lemming realizes that he was at fault for his wife going astray and decides to save her from being burned at the stake. Although he's initially locked up, he breaks out and rescues her from execution, and the executioner, the supernatural expert from 2 segments earlier. He brings her to the woods, only to turn into the werewolf once more and kill her! This, Milgrom's last contribution to the series would have been a good ending, but alas the series would continue in a new direction for a while after this.

The second part of "Hunter" is third, by Paul Neary (art) and Rich Margopoulos (story). This story tells the origin of Hunter. In the year 2001 (ha! years back for us now, but over 25 years in the future at the time this issue was published) nuclear war resulted in mutating much of humanity into demons. One such demon, General Ophal raped a human woman, producing the offspring Demien, aka our hero Hunter. After her death from Pox he joins a group of human soldiers and is trained on fighting demons.

A new series starts up next, Schreck. The first segment is titled "First Night of Terror!" by Vicente Alcazar & Neal Adams (art) and Doug Moench (story). Schreck is influenced heavily on the Omega Man (recently redone as I Am Legend). In the future, nuclear testing by the Chinese on the moon has caused a chain reaction that causes most humans on Earth to become white-eyes zombies. This story surrounds the title character, Derek Schreck, who flashes back to how everything came to be while fighting off the zombies. By the end of the story his wife Paula has cut off his hand with a cleaver and become a zombie along with his friend Lee. A pretty good start, although this was the only story in the series that Adams contributed to.

Last is "Spawn of the Dead Thing". This story carries the series title "Fathom Haunt" although this ends up being a stand alone story. A rather surreal and incomprehensible story about the title character, who fights the 'Dread Thing' and its Spawn. Terrific art by Sutton in one of his last Eerie appearances.

Creepy 84

An all sports issue! Like the Christmas specials, was never a big fan of these, even though I am a sports fan. The cover is by Ken Kelly.

First up is "Hitter's Wind!" by Carmine Infantino & Walt Simonson (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). The story takes place in the negro leagues just before the great depression, and is about a ball player who sacrifices his life to win the pennant, dying just after he hits the game winning hit.

The issue's best story is next, "The Mummy's Victory" by Richard Corben (art) and Roger McKenzie (story). A mummy in museum comes back to life and takes the place of an injured player in a football game, winning the game for them! Funny art by Corben on the mummy. A sequel would be done in the next all sports issue, Creepy 93.

Third is "Till Hell Freezes Over!" by Carmine Infantino & Dick Giordano (art) and Steve Englehart (story). When a hockey player dies during a game due to a hit by an opponent, an angry woman fires a gun into the scoreboard that ends up shorting out the electricity for the whole building. With everyone trapped in the building and the temperature getting lower and lower, everyone eventually freezes to death.

Fourth is "Home Stretch" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Roger McKenzie (art), about a horse and the hunchback taking care of it who are burned to death when the owner hires a jockey to burn the stable down for the insurance money on the horse. Both the horse and hunchback die, but come back from the dead to take revenge.

Fifth is "Menace, Anyone?" by Carmine Infantino & Al Milgrom (art) and David Micheline (story). A black tennis player is very successful in a tournament, so the racist governor kills him. The player's friend brings him back to life so he can win the tournanment, and also sacrifices his life for him so he can remain alive.

Last is "Relic" by Carmine Infanino & John Severin (art) and Roger McKenzie (story), which features baseball in the future, where robots are all the players. The story focuses on an old human manager, the last one in the game, and his friendship with the first robot to ever play the game, Jackie-7, who is now quite out of date. Despite Jackie-7's destruction, they are able to win their final game together.

Stories for the most part aren't badly written, but having 4 of 6 stories written by the same writer and 4 of 6 stories pencilled by the same artist certainly result in a lot of repetiveness here, at least in my opinion.

Eerie 52

A very good issue of Eerie, featuring the Grim Reaper on the cover, and promising the death of one of the magazine's recurring characters (which doesn't actually occur, although we do have the final Dax story).

First up is "Ghoulish Encounter", part of The Mummy Walks serial, by Jaime Brocal (art) and Steve Skeates (story). Jerome Curry, now permanently stuck in the mummy's body due to the theft of the amulet, pursues the thieves who stole it, leaving his human body in a graveyard. He finds the thieves, but the amulet is already gone, taken by a woman who was with them. Meanwhile his body is found by a crazy woman with a taste for human flesh. Upon his return, finding his mostly eaten body, the Mummy kills her on a spiked fence. Luckily for him, it was actually another body she had eaten and his body is unharmed. Brocal's art continues to be amazing in this serial.

On to Curse of the Werewolf next, with the story "Darkling Revelation" by Martin Salvador (art) and Allen Milgrom (story). Arthur Lemming comes across a group of gypsies in the woods and stays with them. There he falls in love with a young woman and asks her grandmother to read his fortune. While she's doing it however, the full moon arrives and he turns into the werewolf, running amock. He kills both his lover and the grandmother among many others, but not before she curses him to gain the knowledge of everything that has occured while in his werewolf form.

Third is the beginning of Eerie's more popular series, "Hunter" by Paul Neary (art) and Rich Margopoulos (story). Hunter is a half man half demon in the future who battles demons. This first story takes place in a snowy wilderness where Hunter comes across a church and battles three demons within it.

Next is "The Beheaded" by Aldoma (art) and John Jacobson (story). A supernatural expert rents a house haunted by a beheaded ghosts and heads there along with his wife. They soon encounter the headless ghost, and he promises her he'll find her head, which he is fully aware of the location of. The ghost chops off his wife's head and takes it as her own, so he quickly obtains her missing head for her, only for it to be nothing more than a skull, so she retains the wife's head and kills him.

Fifth is a Frederick Moore adaption, "The Golden Kris of Hadji Mohammed" by Isidro Mones (art, miscredited to Munes) and George Henderson (story), about a woman who spurns a sultan and steals a sword from him and flees. The sultan sends a man to find her and he eventually does and brings her back to the Sultan, whom she kills. The two end up marrying and having many children.

The issue wraps up with the final entry in the Dax storyline, "Death Rides this Night!" by Esteban Maroto (story & art). The story begins at the end of an epic battle where Dax is among the many mortally wounded on the battlefield. Death sends his mistress to obtain their souls, but when she encounters Dax he refuses to go along and gets her to stay along with him. Death punishes her by transforming into a snail like creature that bursts aflame. Death himself now encounters Dax, who is given the option to remain alive or finally die. Dax decides to continue living, but suffers a fate worse than death as he was not aware that he was completely paralyzed from the wounds suffered during the battle. The last true Dax story (Warren would very lamely resurrect him for a few stories in the 1980's that had no involvement whatsoever from Maroto), and the best.

Eerie 50

Eerie's fiftieth issue is quite a good one! Seven stories here, and not a bad one in the bunch; a stark contrast to Creepy's fiftieth issue. Very good art and stories across the board.

Up first is the third entry in "The Mummy Walks" serial, "The Mind Within" by Jaime Brocal (art) and Steve Skeates (story). This segment gives us some background info on our protagonist, Jerome Curry, about how he found the amulet he used to become the Mummy, and about his desire to kill the various women who have spurned him in the past. When thieves steal the amulet however, Curry might find himself trapped in the Mummy's body forever!

Next is the third segment in the "Curse of the Werewolf" serial, "This Evil Must Die". Martin Salvador has replaced Dubay & Buckler as the artist, while Al Milgrom remains as writer. An expert on the supernatural comes to town and tries to defeat Arthur Lemming/The Werewolf. Only when he starts using commonly used witch material to fight him, the town mob thinks he is using witchcraft and attacks him!

Third is Satanna, Daughter of Satan! in the story "Genesis of Depravity" by Ramon Torrents (art, in one of only two Eerie appearances) and Doug Moench (story). A woman calls Satan in order to obtain eternal life and beauty. Satan arrives and grants her her wish, by making her the first ever vampire. Her first victim is none other than Count Dracula. A short but good story, Torrent's Satan is quite scary looking.

Next is "Monarch's Return" by Paul Neary (art) and John Jacobson (story). An archeology student comes across an ancient castle occupied by an old woman and her servant, who tells the student that she's not all there in the head and believes he's Agamemnion, a Greek lord. The student plays the part, but soon discovers the truth, that he's about to be killed by her.

Fifth is "Lord's Wrath" by Aldoma (art) and John Jacobson (story). A priest meets with an evil Baron who mistreats his people. By using a poisoned needle on a ring he wears, he knocks the Baron out, who is out cold so long that he wakes up far in the future and is run over by a train.

Sixth is "The Disciple" by Isidro Mones (art) and Steve Skeates (story). A man comes across a cult of people under mind control. When they realize he is having independent thoughts, they try to attack him mentally, only to fail. He manages to kill their leader and is about to leave when he realizes all the power he'd have over them, and becomes the new leader of the cult.

Last is this issue's Dax the Warrior segment, "The Secret of Pursiahz". Dax comes across an old man who has been caring for a man with wings. The winged man, Pursiahz, tells him of how his lover became trapped in a giant spider's web and he was too afraid to stay. Dax heads there and defeats the giant spider, but the woman is dead. Dax discovers there are other winged women, who have been cast away by God and are depending on Pursiahz. Pursiahz tries to fly away towards the sun, but his wings can't support him and he falls to his death.

Eerie 49

A pretty good cover from Enrich here, in a rare non-Vampi cover by him. It features our first story, "Marvin the Dead Thing: One is the Lonliest Number" by Esteban Maroto (art) and Allen Milgrom (story). This story is a parody of the swamp thing, featuring an ignored man who kills himself by jumping in the river, but he comes back to life as a horrific monster. He returns to work, scaring a bunch of people, and eventually befriends a girl who is killed when people try to kill him. He throws her in the river and she becomes a swamp monster just like him! Very funny story.

Up next is "The Death of a Friend!", second part of the series "The Mummy Walks", by Jaime Brocal (art) and Steve Skeates (story). This story takes place in Boston, where Jerome Curry (who appeared at the end of the prior story) occupies a mummy using the amulet he found an dkills a couple. His girlfriend's brother is a witness to the murder, but by the end of the story, the mummy walks again and claims him as another victim.

Third is "Midnight Prey" by Bill Dubay & Rich Buckler (art) and Al Milgrom (story), part two of the Curse of the Werewolf serial. In this segment, Arthur Lemming returns to his human self, not knowing that in his werewolf form he had killed his own daughter. He confronts the man his wife has been sleeping with during a meeting, and the man, lying, accuses Lemming's wife of being a witch, which is promptly believed by everyone after Arthur transforms back into a werewolf and attacks them. By the end of the story Lemming has killed his wife's lover, but the questions surrounding his wife still linger on. Another very good story, although it would be the last drawn by Dubay & Buckler. The back cover of this issue mistakenly says that Lemming's wife is dead, which is not true at this point in the storyline.

Next is "Over Population!" by Paul Neary (art) and Rich Margopoulos (story), which has the series title 'Alien Nation' (although this was the only story of this series, so it appears to have been cancelled). This is a rather dull story to me, in fact I've feel asleep both times I've read it! It features the government putting into place population control in the future by killing select people. Of course one of the protagonists ends up being chosen as one of the people who has to die. A lot of action here, but not all that memorable a story with me.

Next is "Fear Itself!" by Isidro Mones (art, miscredited to Munes) and Steve Skeates (story). The story features an extremely paranoid man who goes so over the edge that he ends up killing his own daughter and her lover when he mistakes them for people stalking him. Really good art by Mones here, who was one of Warren's best artists during his original run with the company.

We wrap up the issue once again with Dax the Warrior by Esteban Maroto. This issue's segment is titled "The Vampire". Dax comes across a large castle and comes across a beautiful woman inside, who as a vampire is accidently killed when she is caught within the shadow of the hilt of Dax's sword (which forms a cross). Her father, also a vampire confronts him over her death and transforms into a creature which Dax fights and eventually beats when he unknowingly lures him outside into the sunlight. Terrific art in this segment, which is one of the two skipped in the Dax compilation in issue 59.

Outside of the Neary/Margopoulos story, a great issue!