Pit of the Damned Devil Worshippers!

Well, once again we made it to Walpurgisnacht-- but can we survive this naughty nacht without getting ourselves burned?! It's gonna be one heckuva Halfway to Halloween fight as Captain Battle swoops in to put a brutal end to some Hellish heathens and their horny wicked ways, from the Feb. '42 issue of Silver Streak Comics #18. But first up, Bob Powell sends us careening down-- down-- down into the flaming caverns of Satan's sizzlin' domain, in an all-time classic Harvey Hit from Hell, via the April 1952 issue of Chamber of Chills #7. THOIA will return after a few days of Mr. Karswell May Day Birthday Recuperayytion, --please stay tombed! 

The Passing of Samantha B

Film history has shown us that on this day, April 21st, in 1880, the 6 founding fathers of Antonio Bay, California deliberately wrecked a clipper ship off the coast so that its wealthy, leprosy-afflicted owner could not establish a leper colony nearby. All crew and passengers were killed, and the sunken ship was eventually salvaged of its treasures by the same men responsible for this senseless tragedy. I'm sure many of you that follow this blog know the rest of John Carpenter's classic, gory, ghost story. So as long as we have the SSS collection handy (see our previous post too), let's take a look at a terrific terror tale possessing quite a few similarities, via the July 1969 issue of Strange Suspense Stories #8. Spectral ship, vengeful spirit, a lonely lighthouse, lots of fog, and a care-free couple suddenly caught up in the clutches of a screaming supernatural spook. Joe Gill script, Vince Coletta illustrations, and Jim Aparo cover art, too!

House of Wax!

APRIL FOOLS! It's not "House of Wax" at all-- it's "House of Whacks!" hahaha from the December 1953 debut issue of Mad #1! APRIL FOOLS! It's not from the December 1953 issue of Mad #1 at all either, it's actually from the December 1953 issue of Eh! #1 published by EC-- errr, April Fools uhhgain, --from Charlton. Eh! ran 700 issues... April Foo... ehhhh... that's to say, 7 issues total before calling it quits, just like I'm calling it quits with this rather annoyingly foolish gag o'my own! And if you think this intro is full of tired attempts at humor, wait'll you get a load of this vampire story, because it's incredibly funny, and totally unique and oooo boy... April freakin' Fools for probably the last goddamn time ever. Yeesh, even the Sam Spade Wild-Root hair tonic advertisment that I tossed onto the end of this post is somehow way sillier!

Rudy Palais: Ghosts & Playmates

We're heading into the weekend now with a fun Friday Frights tribute post to Rudy Palais, (because why not?), featuring an assortment of 60's Silver Age filler quickies that he produced for a variety of creepy Charlton comic book titles, in this case the May 1967 debut issue of The Many Ghosts of Doctor Graves #1, as well as the January 1967 issue of Ghostly Tales #59. As everyone can see, Rudy stayed just as uniquely weird (and sweaty!) as ever in relation to his ghastly Golden Age era works, and I'll never stop being aggravated that we never got around to publishing that Palais hardcover artist's edition for IDW, --arghhh! Also included today: a handful of appropriately spooky ads to really make you feel like a kooky lil kid again. I also think we'll just stick with a Charlton mix for the rest of the month, and if anyone has any complaints about that you can take it up with dear 'ol Doctor Graves!