OtherEric

A couple of early books:

It seems to me that every time something by PKD gets posted on the forums, a lot of us respond that he's one of our favorite writers, even if we can't write his name on the forums. I figured that an appreciation thread might be, well, appreciated. Let's start with some of his earliest appearances in the Pulps. I've got 4 of his 5 appearances in Planet Stories, I'm missing his 2nd story.

I may have to order that direct for the poster....

I know for a while, it seemed like many of the regulars in the paperback thread were racing to put together their runs. Some great stuff:

Here's hoping your year improves in rapid order! I know there have been times in my life where just about the only joy I've found is in comics, they can be a wonderful escape for a while so we can face the world again.

Today's book:

I have so far avoided the lure of UK paperbacks. Don’t ask about pulps and comics…

I consider myself super lucky to have found my copy for under $10 at a local store:

I slept, albeit poorly given that I didn't get my forum fix before I went to bed.

I think the second one should NOT be "Annual", despite it being called an annual on the cover it's really just issue #15 of the regular series. It's admittedly confusing and debatable, though.

I'm quite fond of the Avon Saints:

Actually, the second one is right, it's issue #15 of the regular series. The first is the Kung Fu Special or the Special Album Edition Deadly Hands of Kung Fu. As far as I know there was never a Deadly Hands of Kung Fu Annual published by Marvel, just the issue #15 that was labeled an annual but was part of the regular series.

The only two I've got from the top 20. I've had my copy for over 30 years now and yet there is still some part of me that is just amazed that I own a Mad #1.

I thought it was because Sutton wasn't assigned the Vampirella story in this case, but he was. We'll be getting a new artist in issue #12. Adams has been doing Batman since at least 1968, on covers as well as his two issues of World's Finest and his longer run on Brave & the Bold. I don't think Adams ever did a Batman story for a non-DC magazine, but he did do a "Deadman" story for National Lampoon. According to him, the writer of that story had actually never heard of DC's Deadman, much less that Adams was the artist most associated with the feature. It appeared in this issue, with the legendary cover:

I'll work on that when I get a chance, you can do it either way and neither are particularly intuitive.

@Get Marwood & I: Thank you for updating my status! Don't forget to give @Yorick the UK rider as well, though.

That would be even better, if you could! Thank you.

That would be even better, if you could!

In yesterday, I already shared it in another thread:

Most creators were freelance at this point, and at least some of them (like Adams) were very clear that they would go work wherever they wanted. The companies didn't like it, but they weren't blackballing people like they would have a few years prior. I think both companies realized how popular Adams was and weren't about to drive him away. I didn't say I hated his work, just that I wasn't a huge fan. It does the job well enough, and I can get why others would like it more than I do.

Let's see what I can glean from this... I've got 8 of the books on the list, which I suppose puts me as a mid-level EC collector- not spectacular, but also not doing badly at all. I would have guessed Crime Suspenstories 20 lower and Shock Suspenstories 6 higher. Shock Illustrated 3 seems low as well. I would have guessed Weird Science Fantasy 29 higher, and expect Weird Fantasy 21 to be a candidate for the list soon too. Frazetta only did 3 front covers for EC, and look at how crazy the Famous Funnies covers he did are going these days. I have no clue what Shock Suspenstories 14 is doing that high. If we were going to get anything from the title other than 1 and 6 on the list, I would have expected #5 instead. Good luck finding a Haunt of Fear 17 at that price these days.

Also, just for fun, a couple other comics by the Denny O'Neil/ Neal Adams team from around the same time as this issue, roughly:

Vampirella #10 thoughts: Cover: Bill Hughes last cover for Warren. Not quite the classic his Evily cover on Vampi #2 was, but still a very nice piece. Feary Tales: A stunning piece by Billy Graham. Table of Contents: I don't normally comment on the contents page, but let's pause for a moment at the list of artists: Neal Adams, Frank Brunner, Billy Graham, Tom Sutton, Wally Wood. Holy cow! Fiends in the Night: Clearly a last minute filler for the not yet ready Vampirella story, right down to Uncle Creepy covering the host duties. A fairly slight story, but very well done by Saunders & Sutton. The Marriage: One of those stories where you need to pay attention to the title for the full impact. Short but solid script, adequate art but I'm not a huge fan of Reese. Eye of Newt, Toe of Frog: After several fan page appearances, Frank Brunner makes his debut on an actual story. He only has a handful of Warren stories, but several hundred total credits at the GCD. Gorgeous art, and a clever twist to the story make this one a winner. The Soft, Sweet Lips of Hell: Lots to cover on this one. Let's start with Denny O'Neil: Exact numbers can be a little harder than usual to track down, since the GCD splits his listings between Denny O'Neil and Dennis O'Neil. Suffice to say he's a prolific writer and editor. This is his only Warren story, I believe. It's done with his most famous collaborator, Neal Adams, at the peak of their team-up, while their Batman stories and Green Lantern/ Green Arrow stories are appearing over at DC. It's also the Warren (and possibly comics) debut of Steve Englehart, who has a handful of art credits and thousands of script credits. He'll be back at Warren as a writer later. As far as the story itself goes, it's excellent. It's hard to discern Englehart's style here, it looks very much like Adams' work... which is quite common with Adams and his collaborators, honestly. Note the subtle shout-out to O'Neil and Adams work on Batman on the last page. War of the Wizards: Another Wally Wood masterpiece. Not much to add to that description. Do note that the character Thanos in this story predates Iron Man #55 by nearly two years, not that they share anything but a name, really. A Thing of Beauty: And we get Len Wein's writing debut at Warren, after an illustration on the fan page back in Eerie #22. He has about a dozen Warren stories, he's got over 5000 credits at the GCD, he co-created Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Storm, Colossus, and Swamp Thing. In other words, a major creator. On a more personal note, he's the third creator in this issue I had the chance to meet, along with Adams and O'Neil. The story is pretty good, with amazing art by Graham, but I found the use of only slightly changed names somewhat distracting... Groucho, Mark is the really bad one, but Rachel Walsh is pretty on the nose too. It does verify the resemblance on the cover is intentional, though Regeneration Gap: A solid story, with nice art by Sutton, but I found the twist too similar to "The Cosmic All" a couple weeks ago. That's really not the story's fault, it has to have been in preparation at the same time rather than a rip-off. Overall, this is another excellent issue. It gets marked down slightly for clearly last minute fixes, most notably the first story trying to cover for the delay in the Vampirella story. But this is an incredible issue, with one of the most impressive artist line-ups we've seen yet.

I'm getting a strong Jeff Jones vibe but that's purely a guess.

Yes, I was aware, I got it shortly after it came out. I just wish they would do either a) more Famous First Editions or b) more New Fun reprints. I love that they faithfully recreated the Famous First Edition look for this, the original run of FFE's are roughly as old now as the books the FFE's reprinted in the 70's were then.