Warren Magazine Reading Club! 7 7

[Axe Elf]

On 11/10/2022 at 11:55 AM, OtherEric said:

The obvious starting point is the Silver Age Green Lantern and Atom.  But that's just a starting point, he had noted (if sometimes brief) runs on tons of characters.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gil_Kane

Hmmm... I wouldn't know him from that.

I must be thinking of Kane Roberts, one of Alice Cooper's old guitarists.

Always good to learn about the hobby, though.

[Axe Elf]

EERIE #10 - July 1967

According to the Warren Magazine Index...

10. cover: Gray Morrow (July 1967)

1)  Eerie’s Monster Gallery No. 9: The Wendigo! [Roy G. Krenkel] 1p   [frontis]

2) Warrior Of Death! [Archie Goodwin/Steve Ditko] 8p

3) The Slugs! [Bill Pearson/Joe Orlando] 8p

4) It! [Archie Goodwin/Dan Adkins] 8p

5) Voodoo Drum! [Archie Goodwin/Neal Adams] 8p

6) House Of Fiends! [Archie Goodwin/Jerry Grandenetti] 8p

7) For The Birds! [Archie Goodwin/Gene Colan] 8p

Notes: The monster in Adkins’ story was swiped from the film ‘Five Million Years To Earth’.  Given Ditko’s striking work on the sword & sorcery stories that he did for Warren, one wonders why he never got the chance to work on Conan for Marvel or on any other S&S series (unless you count Shade, the Changing Man).  ‘Voodoo Drum!’ was the art & story fave for this issue.  Adams’ art, reproduced from his pencils, was very moody and his work was well matched by the Goodwin -script.  ‘The Slugs’ was also a rather horrible little story {and I mean that in a good way}.

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I used to think this was one of my better-looking copies among the early EERIEs, but I'm a little more discerning now.  heh

It does look like an absolutely bang-up issue chock full of my favorite artists though--and didn't the Wendigo appear in that Hulk #181 issue that introduced Wolverine?  (See, I'm learning more here than just Warren stuff.)  I'm looking forward to this one!

It feels kind of like we're passing another mini-milestone here, finishing off 15 CREEPYs and 10 EERIEs in the nearly 7 months since we started doing this--and we'll be coming up on the first CREEPY Annual shortly, and other regular issues with many reprints of stories we've already reviewed.

I don't want anyone to feel like they need to rehash their original reviews of any reprinted stories, unless of course there's something new that occurs to us to add.  I plan to continue to give every Annual and reprint issue its own week, but I'll consider them kind of "light" or even "vacation" weeks if people don't feel like contributing those weeks.

Hitting the first Annual will be kind of a half-milestone in and of itself, as in another 7 months we will be through 2 more years of annuals, and coming off the 1970 Annuals will be one heckuva month in the Warren Magazine Reading Club as we consider the classic CREEPY #29, the classic EERIE #23, and the double-secret super-classic VAMPIRELLA #1, all in succession thereafter!  That will happen in mid-June 2023, and it is my most anticipated month in the Reading Club since we started Blazing Combat!

[OtherEric]

Yay for the mini milestone.  Thank you for keeping this running, @Axe Elf.  I've been enjoying it a lot.

Eerie #10 thoughts:

Cover:  A nice design by Morrow that, for better or worse, relied on a blinding white background to really pop... and most copies these days don't have that blinding white.  Here's a scan swiped from heritage, I can see how this must have been amazing on the stands.  But my copy just doesn't have that effect any more.  Would love to see if anybody here has a high grade copy to share.

Monster Gallery:  Krenkel is amazing, it's not his fault we expect a three way fight with Hulk & Wolverine when we hear Wendigo these days.

Warrior of Death:  Nice art by Ditko, nice twist in the story by Goodwin.

The Slugs: I find myself underwhelmed with the style Orlando used for this, but it suits the piece well.  Another case of my appreciating the craft on the story and art while not particularly liking it as such.  I did enjoy it more than Orlando's Adam Link work, though.

It!:  A very good story from Goodwin, playing the twist in the title perfectly.  The art was good but not Adkins' best... he was trying a bit too hard to do his Wood imitation, I think.

Voodoo Drum:  It's interesting seeing Adams pencils, but I don't think it serves this particular story terribly well.  I wonder why it wasn't inked, unless this is our first example of Adams' famous deadline crunch issues.

House of Fiends:  We've established that I'm not fond of Grandenetti's style, and this has less of his impressive craft moments to keep me interested.  The design of the EEEEEEEE on the bottom of the second page is spectacular, though.

For the Birds:  Nice art by Colan, but I think Goodwin correctly identified his ---script with the title.

This issue left me a bit cold, but it was mostly me, not the actual work done.  Maybe I was in the wrong mood when I read it, maybe it's just one of those issues where not much happens to click with me as a reader, maybe it's partly the order of stories... I don't think anything else lived up to the Ditko/ Goodwin opener.

 

 

Edited November 13, 2022 by OtherEric

[Axe Elf]

I was about to compliment your bright white copy and how modest you were to not include the grade--and then I realized that one wasn't yours.

I might have you slightly out-whited.

[OtherEric]

On 11/12/2022 at 11:02 PM, Axe Elf said:

I was about to compliment your bright white copy and how modest you were to not include the grade--and then I realized that one wasn't yours.

I might have you slightly out-whited.

I think you do.  It's fairly close, though.

I'm glad I went looking for a high grade scan, though... it really does pop nicely if the cover is properly white.

[The Lions Den]

On 11/13/2022 at 1:49 AM, OtherEric said:

This issue left me a bit cold, but it was mostly me, not the actual work done.  Maybe I was in the wrong mood when I read it, maybe it's just one of those issues where not much happens to click with me as a reader, maybe it's partly the order of stories... I don't think anything else lived up to the Ditko/ Goodwin opener.

Could it be that the impending Warren financial crunch was already starting to have an effect? And possibly Goodwin was beginning to get a little burned out at this point?    

[OtherEric]

On 11/13/2022 at 7:43 AM, The Lions Den said:

Could it be that the impending Warren financial crunch was already starting to have an effect? And possibly Goodwin was beginning to get a little burned out at this point?    

Certainly not impossible.  It's also possible that even if the creators were still enthused, they were just reaching the limits of this particular approach.  25 magazines means there have been 150 or so stories so far. Once Warren gets past the crunch, the three main books will all wind up going in different directions to some degree, whereas right now Creepy and Eerie are pretty interchangeable.

[Axe Elf]

This week really got away from me--and it wasn't helped by the fact that I had to take a break after the first couple of stories, which hadn't exactly left me thirsting to return to the book--but I'm getting ahead of myself...

The cover made more sense to me after reading the associated story (probably more sense than the story itself made--but I'm getting ahead of myself again)...

Still can't believe how nice that white cover looks.  Some of my best Vampis are the ones with pristine white covers, though, so I can see how that pumps up the eyeball appeal of a book.

So that's a Wendigo, eh?  Don't think I'd ever heard of one before, outside of seeing some Hulk 181 covers since being on this forum.  I'm in absolute AWE of Krenkel's technique on this Monster Gallery page.  It's so intricately detailed, with outlines merely suggested by variations in the crosshatching...  When you zoom in on a limited area, it's hard to make out what you're looking at, but the whole is greater than the sum of its parts!

I kind of identified with the writer on the Letters page that seemed to be unaware of Ditko's previous work on Spiderman and Dr. Strange.  I giggled at him much like most of you must giggle at me as a comics newbie when I can't place some of the big names in the industry.  Also kind of giggled at the Philistine who wrote that "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" was a "complete dud" with a "confusing" story--and another writer who was skeptical that Goodwin had stolen the story from a Twilight Zone episode!  Stay away from the classics, guys...

"Warrior of Death" was another solid sword and sorcery vehicle for Ditko's talents, but the ending of the story was really dumb.  Immortality means immortality, not that you can be killed by another immortal.  Zahran should have taken Death to court for breach of contract.

"Slugs" was just as stupid; I read it twice and I still don't really get it.  First the jungle comes alive, ensnaring the guy with the wounded leg, killing him with a "weed-clogged windpipe," and turning him into a "slug" that just wants to lie around in the water all day.  His family doesn't recognize him and inadvertently kills him (or do they?), while his sister is attacked by vampiric flying squirrels that eventually do all the rest of them in, and then they all become "slugs" too?  So who or what is the bad guy here--the people who have already become slugs?  The vampiric flying squirrels?  The swamp itself?  I mean come on, this makes no sense at all.

I was slightly amused by the fact that someone took a little artistic license with the copy that was scanned for my digital version by coloring in the girl as she's being attacked by flying squirrels...

...but after these first two stories, I put down the book to take a break, because this one started out with the potential to be the worst issue we've read so far, and I was kind of over it at this point.  That's probably why I didn't get this review posted until Friday; I stopped reading it for a day before I came back to brave the rest.

And I'm glad I did.

Things picked up a little with "It"; the monster and the twist seemed credible--although I could quibble with the cleverness of a plan that left the ship stranded out in space with no power--that's as much of a death sentence as dealing with the monster(s) in the first place.  But you know, someone will probably happen along and find them... right...?

The real masterpiece of the issue (artistically, anyway) was the Neal Adams vehicle "Voodoo Drum."  Ironically, I probably wouldn't have even noticed that it was done in just pencil if @OtherEric hadn't mentioned it--but being aware of it going in just made me appreciate it that much more.  It really is more like looking at an artist's sketchbook than like some of the more "finished" pieces, but I was fascinated by that--from the detail of the drops of sweat on a brow to the obfuscation of the shadows.

The story itself maybe wasn't quite on the "masterpiece" level--you could pretty much see the end coming from all the attention drawn to the cat tattoo from his open shirt in the early frames--but it wasn't as ludicrous as the first couple of stories here.

If "Voodoo Drum" is an artistic masterpiece with a story good enough to make it worthwhile, then "House of Fiends" was more the other way around--a really delightful story with Grandenetti art good enough to make it pop.  Grandenetti often strikes a nice balance between realism and cartoonishness, which was just perfect for this story.  For some reason, I was really fascinated with the mailbox on the opening page--the sharply inked cartoon lines contrasting with the softer realistic shading...

...but as @OtherEric mentioned, the "EEEEEEEEEE" was amazing!

I was really engaged in the story and the action as the hero fought his way through monster after monster to save the girl, only to come face to face with the twist--one of the best Goodwin monster stories yet!

"For the Birds" was kind of a throwaway tale by comparison; you pretty much knew the birds would be the death of the villain someway, somehow, from the get-go...  but having his bones picked clean by pigeons like he'd fallen into an Amazon river infested with piranha was a bit much.

Batman on the Back Cover got a little of the color treatment as well:

So a VERY mixed bag this week--one artistic masterpiece, one narrative masterpiece, a few standard Warren-type twisters, and then a couple of duds that needed a little rewriting to make any sense--both of which were unfortunately positioned at the beginning of the issue.  I can see why @OtherEric said that this issue left him a little cold, as it's probably one that I could do without as well--although I am glad to have experienced "Voodoo Drum" for its art and "House of Fiends" for its story.

Edited November 19, 2022 by Axe Elf

[The Lions Den]

On 11/13/2022 at 12:04 PM, OtherEric said:

Certainly not impossible.  It's also possible that even if the creators were still enthused, they were just reaching the limits of this particular approach.  25 magazines means there have been 150 or so stories so far. Once Warren gets past the crunch, the three main books will all wind up going in different directions to some degree, whereas right now Creepy and Eerie are pretty interchangeable.

It's just an observation, but one of the reasons I say this is because both Eerie #10 and Creepy #16 appear to be the last issues with the story and art credits written in the same often used typeset in the bottom margin. After that, the credits in Eerie #11 and Creepy #17 appear to be inscribed from a regular typewriter, and then things really take a tumble...     

[Axe Elf]

CREEPY #16 - August 1967

According to the Warren Magazine Index...

16. cover: Frank Frazetta (Aug. 1967)

1) Creepy’s Loathsome Lore: Spirits! [Archie Goodwin/Gil Kane] 1p   [frontis]

2) A Curse Of Claws! [Archie Goodwin/Neal Adams] 6p

3) Frozen Fear! [Archie Goodwin/Reed Crandall] 6p

4) Thane: Angel Of Doom! [Archie Goodwin/Jeff Jones] 6p

5) The Frankenstein Tradition! [Archie Goodwin/Rocco Mastroserio] 8p

6) There Was An Old Lady [Daniel Bubacz & Archie Goodwin/Sal Trapani] 6p

7) The Creepy Fan Club: Rocco Mastroserio Profile/A Stroke Of Genius [Archie Goodwin & Tim Stackline/Dan Gosch, Louie Estrada & Philip Marcino] 2p   [text article/story w/photo]

8) Haunted Castle! [Archie Goodwin/Donald Norman] 6p

9) The Sands That Change! [Clark Dimond & Terry Bisson/Steve Ditko] 8p

Notes: Frazetta’s classic cover featured a largely naked blonde with glowing eyes surrounded by a pride of leopards and a single black panther.  Jeff Jones made his comics (and possibly professional) debut here.  Adams’ & Crandall’s art jobs were noticeably lackluster.  Clark Dimond mentions that Steve Ditko didn’t really like ‘The Sands That Change!’ but turned out a professional job nonetheless.  Mastroserio takes the art honors here.

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Hmmm...  looks like more than a single black panther to me.  There's the one on top of the log to the left and the one under her arm, at a minimum, and there's a "black" cat in the shadows behind her and to her left--but that one COULD be a leopard that's just too shadowed to make out its spots.  I was going to make some joke about "spotting" a black panther under the log, but if I spotted him, he'd be a leopard and not a panther, now wouldn't he?

I probably should have made the CREEPY 1968 Yearbook our issue for this week, with it being Thanksgiving and all.  It would have been a good "vacation" week.  But I guess @OtherEric probably already has his review done for this week anyway, so maybe it's better this way.

Looks like a promising issue, although my early delight at seeing Neal Adams and Reed Crandall leading off the issue was muted somewhat by the Index calling their art jobs "lackluster."  Hmph.  I guess we'll see.  Also nice to see Ditko doing a piece NOT scripted by Goodwin.

Jeff Jones' debut?  Someone want to educate me on who Jeff Jones is?  Whoever he is, it's nice to see the second "Thane" installment so soon, while the debut is still pretty fresh in my mind.  I don't think I've seen Sal Trapani's name as an artist before, either.

So it looks like a lot to look forward to!

Edited November 20, 2022 by Axe Elf

[OtherEric]

I wouldn't have blamed you if you had moved it, @Axe Elf, since there's was a decent reason to do so with the holiday.  But yes, I have my write-up ready to go, as I generally do.  Although, as usual, it gets tweaked a little when I see your initial thoughts.

Creepy #16 thoughts:

Cover:  I've been trying very hard to keep my "This cover is perfect" type comments in the reading group to a minimum, which is not always easy with Frazetta.  And it gets boring calling every one a masterpiece.  With that said, this cover is perfect and a masterpiece.

Loathsome Lore:  This marks Gil Kane's second and final work for Warren.  Like I said before, it's a shame he didn't do more.  But it's fun that he's on the list of Warren creators, at least.

A Curse of Claws:  I could be completely wrong, but it feels like the story was written after Goodwin saw the cover.  (We know that was not an unusual pattern in later Warren books, there's at least a few issue with multiple stories based on one cover.)  I think the story feels a little shallow, for lack of a better word, because of that... but it's solid work by Goodwin & Adams for what it is.  A very well done but fundamentally minor story is perhaps the best way to describe my reaction.

Frozen Fear:  Again, very well done, this time by Goodwin & Crandall...  but the twist feels slighly by the numbers to me.

Angel of Doom:  Jones was always a magnificent artist, even here in her first professional story.  But I'm not sure it was ever the best fit for typical sequential comic book stories, and it feels like Goodwin may have felt the same.  It feels like there's a LOT of text and dialogue pulling a fair bit of weight explaining the images. 

The Frankenstein Tradition:  Excellent stuff from Mastroserio here, illustrating a solid piece from Goodwin.

There Was an Old Lady:  Sal Trapani was an extremely prolific artist, he has over 1000 entries at the Grand Comic Database.  This was the first of a handful of Warren stories they did.  I can't find any other credits for Daniel Bubacz at the GCD, I suspect this is another example of Goodwin adapting a Fan Club story.  It's actually a pretty solid story.

Haunted Castle:  A very effective little piece by Goodwin & Nodel, with Nodel impressing me on art duties far more than his earlier Warren work.

The Sands that Change:  Here we get somebody other than Goodwin writing the piece for Ditko.  I actually really like the conceit of the story, but apparently Ditko didn't.  It's less impressive than his normal Warren work, but still high quality.  Neither Dimond nor Bisson had a huge comic book career, but they did a handful of stories for Warren, and Bisson later went on to be a successful SF/ Fantasy writer who has won the Hugo and Nebula.

Overall, a very strong issue all the way through, although it lacks a standout story to put it quite in the top tier of issues we've seen so far. 

[Axe Elf]

On 11/20/2022 at 12:32 AM, OtherEric said:

This marks Gil Kane's second and final work for Warren.

Ah.  Saw his name was there again, but didn't realize that the next time would be the last time.  Another bit of comics history passes briefly through the Warren lens.

On 11/20/2022 at 12:32 AM, OtherEric said:

Jones was always a magnificent artist, even here in her first professional story.

Jeff Jones is a her?

[MyNameIsLegion]

On 11/20/2022 at 1:05 AM, Axe Elf said:

Ah.  Saw his name was there again, but didn't realize that the next time would be the last time.  Another bit of comics history passes briefly through the Warren lens.

Jeff Jones is a her?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Catherine_Jones#Gender_transition Yes. She passed in 2011.

[Axe Elf]

On 11/20/2022 at 5:42 AM, MyNameIsLegion said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Catherine_Jones#Gender_transition Yes. She passed in 2011.

Wow, interesting.

[OtherEric]

On 11/20/2022 at 9:35 AM, Axe Elf said:

Wow, interesting.

To answer your original question:  Jones was probably better known as a cover artist than for her interiors, she only did a handful of stories longer than one page that I'm aware of, probably more than half of those for Warren.  They were a member of "The Studio" in the 70's, along with Bernie Wrightson, Barry Windsor-Smith, and Mike Kaluta.  Her ex-wife, Louse Jones (later Louise Simonson) will later turn up as an Editor of the Warren Mags as we continue through the reading club.  If you want I can try to scan and post some paperback covers later.

[The Lions Den]

On 11/20/2022 at 12:35 PM, Axe Elf said:

Wow, interesting.

The story goes that with the flood of fantasy and sword and sorcery books being published in the late 60's and early 70's (due in large part to the success of Frazetta's Conan paperback covers) Jones filled a much-needed gap in the marketplace for high quality paperback covers. But over time, Jones actually morphed into something even more impressive, transcending the paperback cover art genre and becoming more of a fine artist. It's said that Frazetta himself once called Jones "the greatest living fantasy painter in the world."

I was lucky enough to befriend her shortly before her death, and I can tell you that not only did she have an amazing talent, she was also a very warm, generous and kind soul...  

[Axe Elf]

On 11/20/2022 at 12:08 PM, OtherEric said:

If you want I can try to scan and post some paperback covers later.

Anything related to the Warren mags or their contributors is fair game for the thread, as far as I'm concerned.

I'll even let Dox's comments stand this time--even though the first one was unnecessary--as I assume that the image is an example of a Jones cover.

[OtherEric]

An Epic illustrated cover by Jones:

Edited November 20, 2022 by OtherEric

[wpbooks01]

 

[OtherEric]

I know I have more books with Jones covers, but these are the ones I could find after a quick search.  Some are in my storage unit for sure.