Reading Room / Tales Twice Told BACK MAGIC "Buried Alive!"

Tuesday, We Presented the Later Version of This Tale...

...now, we show you the earlier version created by one (possibly two) Silver Age comics legends!

Illustrated by Steve (Spider-Man/Doctor Strange) Ditko, the writer of this tale from Prize's Black Magic Comics V4N4 (1954) is unknown.

It could be either Jack (King) Kirby or Joe Simon, or both, since they were the editor/art director team of the Simon & Kirby Studios which packaged Black Magic and several other books for Prize Comics!
But we don't know for certain!
(And if I have to explain who Jack Kirby is, you're not a regular reader of this blog!)
One thing we are certain of...while both stories used the same script (with a couple of modified word balloons), Ditko's version runs six pages, while Munoz's remake is seven pages long!
Don't believe me?
Click HERE and compare!

Which one do you, dear reader, believe is an example of better storytelling?

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Steve Ditko Archives Vol 1

Strange Suspense

(Which reprints this story...but in black and white)

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Wednesday World of Wolverton JOURNEY INTO UNKNOWN WORLDS "Planet of Terror!"

Our Final Basil Wolverton Tale is Illustrated by Him...

...but likely not scripted by him, from Atlas' Journey into Unknown Worlds #7 (1951)!

Even the Grand Comics Database, which normally attributes scripting of Basil's tales to him is uncertain what to make of this somewhat disorienting ending!

You'll note the inset art for the story on the cover, by an unknown artist, has none of the elements of the tale itself!

What's the truth?

We'll likely never know...

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Brain Bats of Venus

Life and Comics of Basil Wolverton

Volume Two

1942-1952
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Reading Room / Halloween Horror MONSTER OF FRANKENSTEIN COMICS "Premonition of Death!"

Some things just can't be explained by current science...

...but that doesn't make them any less real!

Is this a lost "Kirby Klassic" from the 1950s?

When Prize Comics' Monster of Frankenstein title was revived during the horror comic boom of the early 1950s, besides a wonderfully-gruesome version of Dick Briefer's previously-humorous Monster, it featured a number of two to four page "fillers".

Most of these tales appear to be, at the very least, laid-out by Jack Kirby.

This never-reprinted story from V3N3 (1954) is a prime example.

The Grand Comics Database lists the story's illustrator as Marvin Stein, who worked primarily for the Simon & Kirby studio, so this most likely was an S&K "inventory" story laid-out by Kirby and meant for insertion wherever editorial page count came up short.

Sadly, the writer of the story is, as in so many cases, unknown...

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Marvel Masterworks

Atlas-Era Journey into Mystery

Volume 1

Reading Room / Tales Twice Told THIS IS SUSPENSE "Short Step to Oblivion"

 We saw this tale of terror and justice uncut in Part 1...

Now let's see how it looked after the Comics Code Authority took their censoring scissors to the reprinted version...

The knife, seen in panels 5-7 on the original page, is now missing!

The knife in panels 3 and 5 is missing in the reprint page!

Despite being removed from the previous pages, the knife is shown to be the murder weapon!

But how did the knife get there if it was deleted from the earlier pages?

Ruth's word balloon in the last panel is rewritten to eliminate reference to the knife shown on the original page!

Why is Ruth screaming?

It's not like there's a dead body, like there was in the original page!

Why did the villain fall to his death?

Maybe it's the fact that Holiday shot him in the original version of the first panel!

This Comics Code Authority-eviscerated reprint appeared in Charlton's This is Suspense # 24 (1955).

The writer is unknown and the illustrator is George Evans.

A comic with no more violence or blood than a TV cop show of the period is gutted by the CCA to Protect the Morals of the Youth of America.

Take a good look at your parents.

Did it work?

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Ten-Cent Plague

The Great Comic Book Scare and How It Changed America

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Wednesday World of Wolverton ADVENTURES INTO TERROR "Where Monsters Dwell!"

Though this cover-featured tale's title became the name of a Marvel reprint comic...

...the story was never reprinted in its' namesake!

Nor does the cover art for Atlas' Adventures Into Terror #7 (1951) by George Tuska and Joe Maneely show anything even vaguely like what this Basil Wolverton penned and illustrated feature is about!

BTW, the splash panel was redrawn by another, unknown, artist!

When the tale was reprinted in Marvel's Curse of the Weird #3 (1994)...

...cover artist Ron Wagner deliberately mimicked the art style of each of the original tales' illustrators!

And, the story title on the cover used a modified version of the logo for the Bronze Age reprint book!

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Brain Bats of Venus

Life and Comics of Basil Wolverton

Volume Two

1942-1952

Reading Room BLACK MAGIC "Man Who Captured a Ghost!"

Most people wouldn't consider our judicial system a source of horror...

...at least not the non-corporeal type of terror!

Since Kirby (and Joe Simon) were the editors/art directors for the book, it's not unreasonable to think one or the other was also the story's writer.

While Kirby is clearly the cover artist...

...the interior art for the never-reprinted, cover-featured, tale from Prize's Black Magic V2N1 (1951) seems to be a combination of his layouts, pencils by Mort Meskin, and inks by Meskin and George Roussos!

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Simon & Kirby Library: Horror!

(which doesn't include this story)
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