Christmas Creepyness MYSTIC "Help Wanted!"

A Christmas tale that begins just before Easter...

...proves it doesn't pay to be a Scrooge!

Mort Lawrence illustrated this tale of Xmas justice from Atlas' Mystic #19 (1953) including a rather...unusual-looking...demon.

This proved a tad problematic when editor Roy Thomas made the tale the cover feature for an issue of Marvel's 1970s horror reprint anthology Vault of Evil!

Penciller Gil Kane and inker John Romita Sr followed the demon's design perfectly...but someone forgot to tell the cover copywriter what the story was about!

There's no story in #6 (1973) even vaguely-related to insects!

And detail-obsessed Roy Thomas is the last person you'd expect to allow such a mistake!

Please Support Atomic Kommie Comics!

Visit Amazon and Order...

Krampus

CoronaVirus Comics CHAMBER OF DARKNESS "Day of the Red Death!"

Here's another "adaptation" of Edgar Allan Poe's classic tale of disease...

...which, for a change, freely admits the source material!

In fact, out of the mouth of Stan (the Man) Lee himself...

A rich, uncaring guy who has the power to destroy the entire world and wouldn't hesitate to allow a plague to do so...as long as he was safe!

Now who does that remind us of?

Writer Roy Thomas had been a teacher before turning to writing/editing comics, and he loved utilizing classic literature in his work!

Don Heck, whose Marvel work was usually inked by others, apparently relished the opportunity to do both penciling and inking, as he had done in his 1950s horror and war comics work!

In addition, John Romita Sr turned in a wonderfully-rendered cover which was somewhat obscured by the black tints used to create "mood".

Look at the original art to see the detail you might've missed on the printed version...

Kool, eh?

Please Support Seduction of the Innocent!

Visit Amazon and Order...

Raven and the Red Death

Adapted by Richard Corben

WEIRD MYSTERIES "Life Insurance"

When you're a kid, the idea of "life insurance" is like "health insurance"...

...something that would keep you alive just as health insurance pays for curing you!

(Makes sense, doesn't it?)

Rod Serling later did a Twilight Zone episode, "Escape Clause", using the same concept, with a different ending.

If you think about it, what we call life insurance should really be called death insurance!

The art team for this tale from Key Publications' Weird Mysteries #11 (1954) combines the legendary and the obscure with pencils by John Romita Sr (Spider-Man) and inks by Les Zakarin (who has only a couple of dozen credited stories, but probably worked, uncredited, on many more tales).

In fact, Romita apprenticed under Zakarin before going off on his own.

This story has been reprinted only once, in Stanley Publications' b/w magazine Chilling Tales of Horror #1 in 1969, but it's so much kooler in color!

Join us next week as we present another tale your grandparents didn't want your parents to see!

Support Small Business!

Visit our

Horror Comics of the 1950s

Comic Collectibles Store