Eerie 25

A whopping eight stories in this issue, six of them new. This issue features a cover by Jim Steranko, his sole one for Warren. The frontis is "Eerie's Monster Gallery: Vampire!" by Tony Williamsune (art) and Bill Parente (story).

Up first is "Isle of the Vrukolakas" by Ernie Colon (art) and Don Glut (story). A town is plagued by a vampire. Zorko, a sheep herder is convinced that the vampire is the corpse of a man recently brought to the town. They consult a priest, who says the vampire's body will not be decayed. They find the corpse of the man brought to the town, but it is completely decayed so they now have no clue who the vampire could be. Yet it ends up that he was the vampire after all as he had leprosy, and he comes to kill Zorko!

Next is "Mistake!" by Bill Black (art) and Buddy Saunders (story). A mob boss plans to hide from the law by faking his death in Italy. There, in his home town he bribes various people to fake his death, declare him dead, and bury him in a maesoleum in a coffin with air holes so he can live. When he awakens he tries to escape the graveyard, only for people to mistake him for a vampire and kill him!

Third is "Hijack to Horror" by Tony Williamsune (art) and R. Michael Rosen (story). This story features a group of vampire like creatures that hijack a plane and bring it to their new Transylvania where they plan on using the plane passengers to be a never ending supply of blood for them.

Fourth is "To Pay the Piper" by Eugene Colan (art) and Larry Ivie (story), originally from Eerie 2.. The story takes place in a town plagued by vampires. A piper offers to rid the town of the vampires by playing a song on his pipe in exchange for money. He does so and rids the town of vampires, but the town refuses to pay, so using his pipe he lures the children away, as in the classic Pied Piper story. Men wait for him in the woods however and kill him with arrows. They soon find however that he lured the children into wolfsbane, turning them all into werewolves!

Fifth is "Southern Exposure" by Tom Sutton (art) and Bill Parente (story). This is the first part of a two part story that would be concluded in the next issue. A woman faints at a family party and an old woman who hasn't spoke in years says she must be destroyed. Her boyfriend refuses to do so, but at the end of the story, it is revealed that she is a vampire!

Sixth is "The Thing in the Cave" by Mike Royer (art) and R. Michael Rosen (story). Finally, a story not about vampires! A young man and his wife come to visit his parents. The man, who studies funguses, as investigating a mushroom that transforms anything that touches it into a monster! When he and his wife visit a cave and approach some, he turns into a monster and kills her, exactly what he had done to a friend when he was a kid. His mother meanwhile plans on cooking dinner with the mushrooms, unaware of their power.

Seventh is "House of Evil", with art by Jerry Grandenetti (uncredited) & Joe Orlando, and story by Archie Goodwin. This story is originally from Eerie 4. A man comes to a large house where his brother lived but finds only a tape recording there, telling him of how he came to the house, which has an evil past, for inspiration. Suddenly a rotting corpse arrives. The man destroys the corpse, but soon finds that it was his own brother! He then looks at his hands and realizes that he's starting to rot as well.

Last is "Hex Marks the Spot" by Bill Barry (art) and R. Michael Rosen (story). An evil man summons demons to attack those that won't sell their farms to him. But anyone who has a 'good hex' symbol at their house will cause the demon to go back and kill the one who summoned it instead of them. Once such man has a new wife who demands he take down the good hex signs as she doensn't believe him. He does so, but creates another hex sign in his wheat field which results in the evil man getting his just desserts.

Creepy 14

This issue of Creepy features a cover by Gray Morrow of a barbarian fighting a skeleton warrior. The frontis for this issue is "Creepy's Loathsome Lore" by John Severin.

First up is the cover story, "Where Sorcery Lives" by Steve Ditko (art) and Archie Goodwin (story). A warrior, Garth comes after the sorceror Salamand who was responsible for the destruction of his town and capture of his lover. The warrior battles various beasts sent after him by the sorceror and finally comes upon him. The sorceror reveals that he is going to use Garth's body such that the lover will love him, but ends up getting stabbed by her because he let his guard down.

Second is "Art of Horror" by Jerry Grandenetti (art) and Goodwin (story). The story features a writer who plans to play a trick on his two friends in a haunted mansion by masquerading as a ghost. Only after frightening them he realized that he died when falling down the stairs, and truly is a ghost!

Third is "Snakes Alive!" by Hector Castellon (art) and Clark Dimond & Terry Bisson (story). The story is about musicians who come across an old musician who sends snakes after them. Eventually they end up turning into snakes themselves. Castellon's art is quite a dissappointment compared to the other artists in this magazine.

Fourth is "The Beckoning Beyond!" by Dan Adkins (art) and Goodwin (story). A man goes to see his friend, who has created a machine that opens up a portal to another dimension. The two head there, where they find bizarre creatures coming after them. They return to the normal world and the man destroys the machine, but his friend dies, as it ends up that he had already died the first time he used the portal and was only kept alive by heading to the other dimension.

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

Sixth is "Castle Carrion!" by Reed Crandall (art) and Goodwin (story). This story features a knight who comes across a strange castle where a wizard brings multiple dead soldiers to life to fight. The knight tries to escape the castle with the wizard's daughter, but are pursued by the wizard, who turns into a vulture. The wizard is killed by the knight, but this ends up killing the daughter, who was originally dead but brought back to life.

Last is "Curse of the Vampire!" by Neal Adams (art, his Warren debut) and Goodwin (story). The story features a family curse where every member of the vampire is supposedly supposed to turn into a vampire after death. A doctor who has fallen in love with a young woman who is part of the family refuses to let the family servent drive a stake through her since he believes she is just in a coma. It ends up that the servent is the true vampire, and has been able to blame everything on the family due to the curse. The doctor kills him and the girl awakens. However it ends up that the doctor is a vampire, and now knowing that she's human, he makes her his next victim!

Vampirella 104

A pretty good cover of Vampirella by Enrich for this issue, although Vampi looks extremely pale.

First is "The Wax House!" by Jose Gonzalez (art) and Rich Margopoulos (story). Vampi is invited to a wax museum where they are supposed to make a wax statue of her. But it all ends up being a trap by a former stunt woman back from when Vampi was in Hollywood who was horrifically injured in an accident, such that she needs to wear a mask. She hopes to defeat Vampirella and restore her former beauty by taking hers. However, Vampirella ends up defeating her and gets her dumped into a large vat of wax.

Next is "Death Snare!" part of the Pantha serial. Art is by Jose Ortiz and story is by Margopoulos. Pantha does battle with a Lupae spacewoman who was originally introduced in an earlier Vampirella storyline that I have not yet covered on this blog. Pantha convinces her to leave by using the death of a real Panther. After a fairly long running story in this serial things seem to be falling back into a rut again.

Third is the latest entry in the Fox serial, "Jaded" by Luis Bermejo (art) and Nicola Cuti (story). Sha-Ming and her uncle are captured by pirates. She convinces her uncle to let himself be temporarily turned into a jade statue. Only when she tries to reclaim him from a store to turn him back to normal, the statue is dropped and shatters! Quite an interesting turn of events!

Fourth is "Jeremy", a new series. This series, written and illustrated by Paul Gillon, was originally printed in Europe in the early 1970's before being reprinted here. Rudy Nebres provided a one page splash page for this story. This story is about a young boy stranded at sea after the ship he is on is stricken by the plague and they force him out so he won't get it. He lands on what appears to be a deserted island, but is captured by natives, who he is able to escape from due to a fellow prisoner helping. He escapes from them, but finds bats plauging him as he tries to find shelter.

Fifth is the second and concluding part of "Missing You" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Bruce Jones (story). Where the first story took place from the husband's perspective, this story is told from the perspective of his blind wife, who lies motionless on the cliff after falling. Her husband tries to come down and rescue her but falls to his apparant death. A depressing end to a very good two-parter. This short two part series completely overshadowed the drivel that Margopoulos had been providing in Vampi for quite a lengthy time at this point. Unfortunate that this was it for Bruce Jones in this magazine.

Eerie 63

Another terrific issue of Eerie from the peak period of that magazine. The cover, featuring 'Night of the Jackass' is by Sanjulian. The back cover of this issue, which would later be used for Creepy 104, is by Ken Kelly and features Exterminator One. Berni Wrightson provides an intro from Cousin Eerie.

First story is the second part in the 'Night of the Jackass' series, "Storm Before the Calm!" by Jose Ortiz (art) and Bruce Bezaire (story). Garson and Bishop meet up once again at a church that has been taken over by the Jackassers. While no one else wants to go inside and help the victims, Garson and Bishop do so and with the help of people inside are able to defeat all the monsters.

Next is an adaption of Nathanial Hawthorne's "Hollow of the Three Hills!", with art by Esteban Maroto and adaption by Rich Margopoulos. Absolutely amazing artwork from Maroto in this story. A young woman visits a witch, who shows her two depressed looking old people, a crazy man in an institution and a funeral. It ends up that they were all connected to her, the old people were her parents, upset over her leaving them, the crazy guy was her husband, who went crazy after she had an affair, and the funeral was for her child, who died of the pox after she ran off. The trauma from the visions causes the young woman to become comatose.

Third is the latest segment in 'The Spook' series, titled "Stumpful of Granddaddies!" by Leopold Sanchez (art) and Budd Lewis (story). After the death of a wealthy white woman, Crackermeyer is accused of the murder and brought to trial. The Spook helps him out by bringing back her dead husband, then eventually her to clear him of the crime.

This issue's color story is next, "Exterminator One", the second part in this series. The art is by Paul Neary and story is by Bill Dubay. The Exterminator works on his latest case, where he has to kill two men and get one of the victims blamed for the murder of the other. He is able to do this successfully, but during the assassination another hit man, Slaughter, who was friends with one of the killed men spots the Exterminator, blowing his cover. Slaughter looks exactly like the main character from the story "Love Strip" which was published in Vampirella 44. Although that issue came out after this one, the story was originally published in Europe prior to that date making me wonder if Neary swiped the character from Luis Garcia's artwork on that story.

Fifth is "Insanity", which finally brings The Mummy series to an end. Art is by Joaquin Blazquez and story is by Steve Skeates. Rather than wrap up the story of Jerome Curry, this story jumps ahead almost a century and features a young woman who becomes obsessed with reviving the mummy because she thinks she is the reincarnation of its lover. She murders a woman who holds the amulet that can revive the mummy, then revives it. The mummy doesn't want to be alive however and strangles herself then shoots himself so he can be dead forever. A very dissappointing conclusion to this series as we never really find out what happened to Jerome Curry. The previous story indicated that they were going to conclude the story in some way but this was hardly a worthy conclusion. This was one of Skeates's last stories for Warren, perhaps he just wanted to get it over with in any way possible. At the very least, Blazquez's art is quite good.

We wrap up the issue with "The Plague" part two in the 'Apocalypse' series. Art is by Jose Ortiz and story is by Budd Lewis. This story features what is probably Ortiz's best artwork with Warren. Three friends in France, Louis, Armand and Gaston head off to war to fight Germany. The war drags on and ends in defeat for France. As they head back during the winter the three friends fall hopelessly behind their comrades and stay behind to stay with Armand, who has broken his leg. Louie and Gaston search for food to no avail. Louie soon realizes that Gaston is sneaking out each night. He initially thinks that he is foolishly searching for food that isn't there each night, but after Armand's death he realizes the truth, that Gaston has found food in a nearby abandoned barn and has hid it from them. Louie responds by killing Gaston and eating him, leaving some parts behind to eat on the long way back to France.

Creepy 21

This issue of Creepy has a cover by Gutenberg Monteiro, featuring a man attacked by rats. Probably the worst cover in Creepy's history, this is absolutely awful. This issue's frontis is "Creepy's Loathsome Lore" by Bob Jenney (art) and Bill Parente (story).

First is "The Rats in the Walls" by Bob Jenney (art) and Unknown (story, a HP Lovecraft Adaption). A rather disjointed story featuring a man whose family committed many murder and has rats plauging his new home. Not that familiar with the orignal story, but this adaption didn't turn out to be that interesting a story.

Second is "Room With A View!", with art by Steve Ditko, and story by Archie Goodwin. This story was originally published in Eerie #3. A man arrives at an inn with no rooms available, except for a single one which the innkeeper warns him against staying in. The guest uses it anyway and sees a weird creature in the mirror. Each time he looks in the mirror he sees more creatures appearing until he is completely overtaken by them. Hearing his scream, the innkeeper comes up and finds the room empty, but sees the guest's corpse when he looks in the mirror.

Third is "The Immortals" by Sal Trapani (art) and Ron Parker (story). The Immortals of the title are powerful people who live forever in a futuristic society. A man seeks to become an immortal, even going as far as to reveal some conspirator's hideout. He is successful and made an Immortal, but loses all his individuality as the Immortals are actually controlled by a computer.

Fourth is "A Reasonable Doubt" by Tony Williamsune (art) and Ron Parker (story). A man rescues a girl, Elizabeth, who is pursued by a mob. She tells him that they accused her of being a witch after her parent's deaths. She tells him of her past and they head to a cabin in the woods. It is only there that he discovers the truth, that she's Lizzie Borden, who quickly comes after him with a hatchet!

Fifth is "Swamped" by Angelo Torres (art) and Archie Goodwin (story). This story was originally printed in Creepy #3. A criminal is under pursuit by law enforcement in the middle of a swamp. He comes across a mansion occupied by three vampires. Rather than be killed by them, he leads them to the men pursuing him who are all killed by the vampires. He is captured by the vampires but kills them with stakes during the daytime and runs back out to the swamp... only to be killed by the vampires that the men pursuing him became.

Last is "Timepiece to Terror" by Gutenberg Montiero (art) and Bill Parente (story). A pawnshop owner buys a watch which enables him to go forward and backwards in time. He's able to do so by summoning a demon at a certain time while protecting himself with pig blood. He becomes rich with the watch's powers but the demon eventually kills him when he forgets about daylight savings time.

1984 5

Time for another issue of 1984. Patrick Woodroffe provides this issue's cover.

Up first is "The Greatest Hero of Time and Space!" with Jose Ortiz doing the story and Bill Dubay (as Strontium Whitehead) and Jim Stenstrum (as Alabaster Redzone) doing the story. Standard Dubay sex fantasy story to open up the issue. A young boy's father dies, so he goes to live with his uncle, an old man who lives with about a half a dozen beautiful naked women. He tells the nephew of his various adventures through time with them as they rescue humanity and have other various adventures. It ends up that the women are all actually robots, but that doesn't stop the boy from having an orgy with them all at the end of the story.

Second is part three in the Idi Amen storyline, "Idi and the Ratment of Hunger Hollow". Art is by Esteban Maroto and story is by Bill Dubay. Dogmeat and Idi head to an area where there is a bunch of rats, in an attempt to find a rocket they can get to use to the US. They are confronted by many real rats and the ratmen, but are able to get to the rocket and take off. As usual great art by Maroto but poor story and horrible dialogue by Dubay.

"Timothy Sternback and the Multi-Colored Sunrise" with art by Alex Nino and story by Gerry Boudreau is about a man who experiments with sex with numerous different women. He finds himself transported to another dimension where he's supposed to marry the King's daughter and produce a child to be their heir. He does so, but desires to return to Earth so wishes himself back there when the King give him a wish. In actuality, there was no wish, and they had sent him back by their own choice anyway.

"I Wonder Who's Squeezing Her Now? follows, with art by Wally Wood & Ernie Colon and story by Nicola Cuti. This story was originally intended to be published for the magazine "POW" and was drawn back in 1971. The magazine never ended up getting made, so it finally ended up here. The story surrounds a man whose life is falling apart around him. His wife is having an affair, so he leaves her and has an affair with a woman from his office, which becomes public, getting him fired from his job. His lover ends up in the hospital and he gets beat up by his wife's lover. He decides to kill them, but upon seeing the lover beat her up for having an affair with yet someone else, our hero finds a little better and decides to call it off.

"Luke the Nuke Brings It In!" by Rudy Nebres (art) and Jim Stenstrum (story). A rather boring story about the Luke of the title piloting a shuttle, smuggling illegal aliens, who makes his way through various enemies traps, etc... Don't waste your time with this one.

The latest segment of "Mutant World" by the team of Rich Corben (art) and Jan Strnad (story) features Dimento in yet another battle with other mutants over food. He also battles with a wolf-like creature. Meanwhile a soldier finds Dimento's friend, the woman, and brings her to a nearby compound. Dimento follows but can't get in. Corben's art continues to be quite well done in color here, although the story is still moving rather slowly.

"The Box" by Mike Nassar & Alfredo Alcala (art) and Len Wein (story) is a rather interesting story about a tower which contains a civilization in it serving an entity known as the box. At the end it ends up being a TV show which is cancelled. Not an overly complicated story, but a fairly good one.

Next is "Killman One" by Herb Arnold (art) and Jim Stenstrum (story, as Alabaster Redzone). The story is about an alien woman who hates her husband, a star 'Killman', who fights various competitors in one on one battles to the death. She decides to take him on in one such competition and ends up killing him.

We wrap up with another installment of Rex Havoc, entitled "The Spud from another world! or Who Grows There?". This story is a parody of the movie "The Thing From Another World", and the book it was based on, "The Thing From Another World". It features our heroes in the arctic where an alien being is found frozen. It ends up getting thawed and is an alien potato monster that our heroes try to take out by frying him on a frying pan. A sympathetic scientist screws things up, but Rex is able to set the alien on fire in his ship and take him out.

Some good stories here, but also some very bad ones. Across the board the art is quite good though.

Eerie 9

A very good early issue of Eerie, featuring a cover by Dan Adkins. This issue's frontis is "Eerie's Monster Gallery - The Cyclopses" by Roy Krenkel. Across the board this is a very good issue, with the first and last stories being the best.

First is "Fair Exchange" by Neal Adams (art) and Archie Goodwin (story). An old man whose soon to die plots to steal a young man's body when he discovers of a ridiculed doctor who has experimented on switching bodies. The switch is performed successfully and the old man now in his new body kills the doctor so he doesn't have to pay him. Only he soon discovers that the man whose body he stole is a vampire when he is destroyed by the sun's rays.

Second is "Rub the Lamp!" by Jerry Grandenetti (art) and Allan Jadro (story). A man purchases a magic lamp at an auction and wishes for riches, only to get it when his wife dies and he gets insurance money. He then wishes to live forever which happens when he becomes a vampire! He wishes to be reunited with his wife, and soon is when he trips on a wooden stake, killing himself.

Third is "Terror in the Tomb" by Rocco Mastroserio (art) and Goodwin (story). A pair of archeologists encounter a mummy guarding a pharoah's tomb which ends up coming alive. They destroy it, only to later find out that it was guarding them from the evil pharoah, whose still alive and kills them.

Fourth is "The Wanderer" by Dan Adkins (art) and Goodwin (story). A man appears in a hospital due to a heart attack and is saved by the doctors. The man tells of how he was in a car wreck and found himself wandering a strange realm where demons were after him. He demands to be let go but the doctor refuses, and the demons come for him, leaving only a skeleton behind.

Fifth is "Isle of the Beast!" by Steve Ditko (art) and Goodwin (story). Influenced by the well known story 'The Most Dangerous Game', this features a man shipwrecked on a deserted island with a madman who hunts human beings. The twist is that the man turns himself into a beast in order to heighten the intensity. Only this time the hunted ends up being a werewolf, who attacks his captor during the full moon.

Sixth is "An Occurence at Owl Creek Bridge!" by Bob Jenney (art) and Goodwin (story). This is an adaption of a story by Ambrose Bierce. A man is sentenced to be hanged, and it is done on a bridge. However, during the hanging the rope breaks and he falls into the river below. He swims away and returns home, to be reunited with his wife. Only it ends up that it all was a dream and he was hung after all. An adaption of this story was also used in the final season of the Twilight Zone, resulting in ripoff claims being made in later letter pages.

The issue wraps up with "Experiment in Fear!" by Eugene Colan (art) and Goodwin (story). A nazi concentration camp doctor experiments on jews by locking them in a gas chamber, studying their fear as he experiments with harmless gas that they only think is poisonous, killing them for real once he has sufficient data on the jew's fears. During one of his experiments however the captor escapes and imprisons him in the chamber where he is subjected to the same experiment. The leaders of the camp eventually rescue him but find that the data on his fears are exactly that of the jews. Rather than find the experiments worthless, they instead are convinced that he's a jew, and throws him in the concentration camp, where the captive jews are quite eager to get their hands on him...