Reading Room CRAZY "Frank N. Stein"

For the remainder of the Halloween season, we're gonna tickle your funny bone...

...with a bunch of rarely (if ever) reprinted horror-themed humor strips from the 1950s!

If imitation is "the sincerest form of flattery", then Atlas Comics was easily the most sincere company in the business with no less than four MAD / PANIC imitations; Crazy, Riot, Snafu, and Wild between 1953 and 1956!

Besides humor specialists like Dan DeCarlo, the sheer volume of Atlas humor titles gave the opportunity for artists who usually did Westerns or horror or sci-fi to expand their range, like this tale illustrated (and possibly written) by veteran Bill Everett, who proved more than up to the task with this spoof from Crazy V1 N1 (1953).

Note: Marvel's reincarnated the title several times including a long-run b/w magazine in the 70s-80s.

Reading Room REX HAVOC "Spud from Another World! or Who Grows There?" Conclusion

We Have Already Seen...

...a research base in the Arctic is under siege by an alien who had been trapped in the ice for millennia, but was accidentally-defrosted by the military.

In the ensuing battle, the alien escaped, but left behind a severed arm, which the scientists analyze...

Rex's second tale from Warren's 1984 #5 (1978) takes the classic 1950s movie Thing from Another World, adds a couple of elements from the extremely-different John Campbell short story "Who Goes There?" it was based upon, adds a healthy dose of snark, shakes well, and produces this entertaining spoof.
Note: the suppporting characters are given the names of the actors' who played their counterparts in the original film.
For example, the base commander, named "Hendry" in the movie, is "Tobey" here.
Kenneth Tobey played Hendry in the movie.
Oddly, when Warren published a Rex Havoc one-shot a couple of years later, this tale was the only Rex Havoc tale not included!

Reading Room SIR LEO "Closed Room"

Join the Victorian monster hunter with the 1970s style in his final adventure...

...unseen, until now, by American readers!

How will Sit Leo deal with the demon/creature of the id ?
Destroying the image seems to be the obvious solution, but if Sir Leo destroys it, will Marcel, locked up in an insane asylum die as well?
Guess we'll never know.
Written and illustrated by Jose Bea and co-written by Luis Vigil, this tale from from Dracula #10 (1971) ends the series on a characterisic nebulous note.

Tomorrow, the return of Rex Havoc...

Scary Steve Ditko: Space Adventures #12

Even though it has nothing to do with any of the stories inside Charlton's Space Adventures #12 (1954), it's one of the most famous and most reprinted covers Steve Ditko ever did (excluding Amazing Spider-Man and Amazing Fantasy #15, of course)!

Reading Room EERIE "Dracula" Part 4

When Last We Left Our Vampire...

Dracula has made Lucy Seward a vampire!
Dr Van Helsing arrives, too late to save the poor girl, but not too late to send her tormented soul to the afterlife by staking her thru the heart.
Now, his attention turns to her master...Count Dracula!

Though there were a number of Frankenstein tales in the Golden Age, including Dick Briefer's long-running series, there were only a couple of appearances by our favorite vampire (usually a cameo) before this story in 1953!
The trend continued until the late 1960s when Dracula became a supporting character in the b/w Vampirella magazine.
In 1972, when the Comics Code was revised to allow vampires and other "traditional" monsters, the Count reappeared not only in short stories, but a long-running series from Marvel highlighted by moody art by Gene Colan.