DC Horror titles, do you merely buy for the covers or you enjoy the stories? 2 2

[KCOComics]

On 9/8/2024 at 6:56 PM, 1950's war comics said:

this is the original copy i bought of the rack at Mario's Market in Lansing Mi in 1972 (the store is still there)

and yeah DC bronze horror has magnificent covers !!

That's one of my favorites. 

And the original cover art is for sale through Nostalgic Investments. The OA is colored and looks incredible.  

I asked Bechara and apparently a prior owner had met Kaluta and paid him to paint it.

Adam's and Bernie deservedly get a lot of love for BA Horror. But so many incredible artists made their mark. Ernie Chen is under appreciated. And Kaluta was spectacular!!! 

[Point Five]

As an aside, you should try ECs from the 50s for good/fun/entertaining horror stories. I still think they're among the very best, and they were huge influences on the 60s/70s DC books. They've been reprinted a million times over, thus they are not hard to find and read affordably.

 

[Ken Aldred]

On 9/8/2024 at 11:57 PM, Jayman said:

Could it be this one I remember? Evil guy becomes immortal then the natives throw him into quicksand where he’s stuck forever being eaten alive (then healing) by insects.

House of Secrets 109

 

"A callous, insensitive actor emotionally mistreats his spouse to the point to where she commits suicide by jumping off a set of stairs. The authorities are summoned, and they reveal that the actor Hannibal Hangle has a history of spouses that took their own lives or were committed as a result of his cruelty. Hangle soon finds out that he has been replaced as the lead in a play, so he strikes out on his own determined to create and star in his own play. One evening as Hangle is riding his carriage back home he is attacked by the brother of the woman who was married to Hangle. He blames Hangle for her death and attacks him. The two men struggle but Hangle survives by beating the man to death with a cane. As he wanders through the dark countryside, he encounters an old man who claims that he is on his way to visit a mystic that will grant him immortality. The old man has a key which he claims will unlock the mystic mansion and entitle him to receive any wish. Hangle murders the old man and steals the key for himself. He arrives at the mansion and meets the mystic himself. Hangle announces that he wishes to receive the gift of immortality which the mystic supposedly grants. Hangle then awakes in his own bed where he is nursed back to health from a knife wound. He concludes that the mystic had stabbed him in the heart to prove that he is immortal, but he seems to be suffering from great discomfort. Hangle is still determined to star in his own play, but he lacks the necessary funds. He decides that he must marry a wealthy heiress named Elizabeth Morgan so that he can take control of her fortune. The only problem is that Morgans father has a strong dislike for Hangle and would not approve of the marriage. Hangle gets a maid who agrees to go work for Morgans father so that she can poison him to death and that would leave Hangle free to marry his daughter Morgan. The murder is committed but the maid is so full of guilt that she commits suicide by jumping off a bridge into the water. Her body is fished out when fisherman discover it wrapped in their net. The police are summoned, and they immediately suspect that Hangle is responsible for the death. The police reveal that they wish that they could arrest Hangle but he had apparently had an accident and had been badly burned beyond recognition. The story fast forwards more than a hundred years into the future to 1973 where a carnival showman is urging crowds to come see the miserable sight of a being who has lived over a hundred years and begs for the mercy of death. The star of the show is Hannibal Hangle himself, the Immortal Monstrosity."

Edited September 9 by Ken Aldred

[Ken Aldred]

Marvels, such as Tomb of Dracula, while consistently well-written, were nowhere near this level.  Comparatively tame, in general. 

Edited September 9 by Ken Aldred

[Coverdeath]

On 9/9/2024 at 12:45 AM, Ken Aldred said:

HOM 230

’The Doomsday Yarn’

 

 

Synopsis for "The Doomsday Yarn"

 

“A gambler kills an Indian fakir for his magic yarn and knits a picture of himself surrounded by money. He wins the money in a casino and places the money in a bank. The gangsters that run the casino show up and threaten to kill him unless he gives back the money. He takes them to the bank but meanwhile his cat back at the apartment begins to unravel the tapestry. The money is missing from the safe deposit box but he manages to elude the gangsters. The cat eventually unravels his representation in the tapestry and he unravels in the middle of the street.”

As the guy said: "it's horrible...!" 

This panel is creepy. 

[s-man]

On 9/8/2024 at 6:45 PM, Ken Aldred said:

HOM 230

’The Doomsday Yarn’

 

 

Synopsis for "The Doomsday Yarn"

 

“A gambler kills an Indian fakir for his magic yarn and knits a picture of himself surrounded by money. He wins the money in a casino and places the money in a bank. The gangsters that run the casino show up and threaten to kill him unless he gives back the money. He takes them to the bank but meanwhile his cat back at the apartment begins to unravel the tapestry. The money is missing from the safe deposit box but he manages to elude the gangsters. The cat eventually unravels his representation in the tapestry and he unravels in the middle of the street.”

And his name was...

Spoiler

Eddie Spaghetti 

 

[wardevil0]

On 9/8/2024 at 6:59 PM, Jayman said:

Kaluta! 

Ka-looota!

[Collect Stuff]

Jim Aparo's Spectre stories in Adventure Comics belonged in a horror title 🤘

[Robot Man]

On 9/9/2024 at 6:28 AM, Collect Stuff said:

Jim Aparo's Spectre stories in Adventure Comics belonged in a horror title 🤘

Indeed! The Spectre is my favorite DC “superhero”. The most powerful and vengeful of all. His origin in More Fun 52-53 is Awsome and so tragic. The later Adventure issues are also incredible.

[ThreeSeas]

DC Horror Titles. I remember a few that I haven't re-read in 40 or so years. I started buying every one of the different titles in the early 70's and kept at it until they were no longer published.

Some I do remember:

On the cover of one is a girl and a giant mouse - the girl appears to have been shrunken down and is near the mouse's home/hole. Maybe "The Secrets of Sinister house"? I'll have to go see if I can locate it. (edit No. 13 of that two-year series)

Another story I remember is about a guy that did a hit and run. Every time he drives afterwards, the people he encounters appear to be really mad at him. Spoiler (if I am remembering correctly after all these years), the guy he hit was caught up in his front bumper.

I just went and checked comicspriceguide.com to look at the covers and oh my gosh, I remember and still have many of those. 

The sixty cent giants from 1974 - A lot of value for a dime and two quarters. I loved reading them all.

 

 

 

Edited September 9 by ThreeSeas

[Coverdeath]

On 9/9/2024 at 4:42 PM, Robot Man said:

Indeed! The Spectre is my favorite DC “superhero”. The most powerful and vengeful of all. His origin in More Fun 52-53 is Awsome and so tragic. The later Adventure issues are also incredible.

Do you read the moderns? What about the Moench run? 

[goldust40]

DC's "mystery" titles from the early 70s were what got me into comics in the first place, particularly Wein and Wrightson's Swamp Thing, so there's a lot of nostalgia there for me.

I'd say the stories were mostly if not entirely about ironic punishment and deals with the devil that of course backfire. Nevertheless there were some strong efforts that occasionally pushed the envelope - the House of Mystery 100 pagers and a few of the Weird War Tales issues had lead stories (mostly written by Jack Oleck) that certainly weren't for kids - HOM 225 (Fireman Burn My Child, The Man Who Died Twice) being a good example. With Joe Orlando on board, there was an E.C. connection with these books, although obviously they're relatively toned down. The relaxation of the code meant that the word "weird" could be used for mystery book titles for the first time since the mid-1950s, and DC did use it a lot.

The covers are of course very important, and for three or four years so many of them were superb, but if the stories featured work by Adams, Wrightson, Kaluta, Jones, Redondo etc. that would make a big difference. Sadly by 1975 all the name artists had gone from DC's mystery line, so it does become more about the covers from that point. Never cared for the artists who featured heavily from then on, like Jess Jodloman or Ruben Yandoc.

[Ken Aldred]

On 9/10/2024 at 8:06 AM, Coverdeath said:

Do you read the moderns? What about the Moench run? 

John Ostrander’s series is the best modern run of Spectre comics, for me.

[Jayman]

On 9/10/2024 at 5:50 AM, goldust40 said:

artists who featured heavily from then on, like Jess Jodloman

One of my few pieces of OA. Jess Jodloman on a Madam Xanadu story from Unexpected #194. So many werewolves! 

Edited September 10 by Jayman

[Coverdeath]

On 9/10/2024 at 2:18 PM, Jayman said:

One of my few pieces of OA. Jess Jodloman on a Madam Xanadu story from Unexpected #194. So many werewolves! 

Beautiful panel, just this moon got me

[Zonker]

Sturgeon's Law (90% of everything is crud) certainly applies to the stories contained within DC Horror comics of the 1970s.  But as this thread attests, every now and then a gem would appear well worth reading. 

 

As a tip if you want to test the waters, I found the titles edited by Joe Orlando and Dick Giordano to have a much higher hit-rate than those edited by others (e.g. Ghosts, Unexpected, later Witching Hours)

Giordano: First 13 issues of Witching Hour + early House of Secrets
Orlando: House of Mystery & later House of Secrets.

Edited September 10 by Zonker
oh, crud!

[goldust40]

On 9/10/2024 at 1:18 PM, Jayman said:

One of my few pieces of OA. Jess Jodloman on a Madam Xanadu story from Unexpected #194. So many werewolves! 

Decent work if a little rough in places. Maybe due to following all the key artists who had just departed from DC's horror line, Jodloman looks a bit journeyman-ish by comparison.

[Jayman]

On 9/10/2024 at 10:16 AM, goldust40 said:

Decent work if a little rough in places. Maybe due to following all the key artists who had just departed from DC's horror line, Jodloman looks a bit journeyman-ish by comparison.

But made the OA far more affordable! 

[stock_rotation]

On 9/9/2024 at 12:30 PM, ThreeSeas said:

Another story I remember is about a guy that did a hit and run. Every time he drives afterwards, the people he encounters appear to be really mad at him. Spoiler (if I am remembering correctly after all these years), the guy he hit was caught up in his front bumper.

I don't know if this idea was also used in a DC horror book, but it was originally an Atlas story called "Crazy" in Uncanny Tales 3