ANOTHER MONSTER CRIME

A while back I posted a few covers of crime comics masquerading as horror titles by way of their misleading covers. The most notorious of these was MONSTER CRIME, published by Hillman in 1952 that was known for years as rare, demanding high market prices.

By chance I came across yet another, very similar horror "come-on" by Hillman: CRIME MUST STOP! #1 (October 1952). While not as blatant (they still used a crime title), it's definitely an MC redux with monsters on the cover and straight crime stories inside.

Are there others out there? Maybe so, but I haven't come across any more . . . yet!

Cover artist unknown.

YOU CAN'T JUDGE A HORROR COMIC BY ITS COVER!

After reports that EC Comic's horror titles were becoming profitable, numerous publishers were tip-toeing their way into the field, reluctant to go all in for an as-yet, largely untested new subject. As a result they used an interesting, but misleading "bait-and-switch" tactic.

A number of publishers mimicked EC's strategy of introducing horror stories into their crime titles (CRIME PATROL and WAR AGAINST CRIME), as well as swiping cover design ideas.. Thematically, it seemed like a fairly good fit and it was a cautious way of finding out how readers would react.

There was one problem with that: the cover images were as far as they went -- the interiors were still comprised of the usual crime stories that they had been using all along.

Shown here are a few examples some of the other publishers who experimented (such as it was) to test the blood-filled waters.

This is not an exactly a horror story, but it is definitely a weird tale (STARTLING TERROR TALES #13, art by Jay Disbrow).

Perhaps the most blatant come-on of all was Hillman's MONSTER CRIME, cover-dated October 1952. Behind the cover of the 52-page, 15-cent book were nothing more than crime stories from their overstocked inventory. The closet thing to horror was one story's title, "Another Hallowe'en".