Sunday, January 9, 2011
The Fifth Corpse
With this post, the April 1954 issue of The Unseen #14 is now available here at THOIA in its entirety (minus the text story which I'll kindly add to the next post.) This is a quick and violent gangster horror tale, and you'd have to be Nick Mangoti not to see the ending coming from a card tables length away... so after you're done here, check the THOIA Archives for more stories from this great issue, including: "Monsters of the Deep", "No Rest for the Dead!", and Skeleton's Gibbet", (you might have to dig around a bit for the bonus filler stuff like the funny "Grim Grins" one panel gags and the challenging "Devil's Puzzle.")
Even though it's predictable, I do like the way they "embraced" it by inverting his eyes on the last couple pages.
ReplyDelete... and did the guy have a teaspoon of blood in him? Nobody noticed the holes in clothes? Obviously the blood didn't soak into them! Also, I need a hobby other than looking for plot holes in pre-code horror comics!
Man-o-man do I just LOVE that cover! Wow...just grabs me Daddy-o.
ReplyDeleteHi, I have just awarded your fantastic blog a 'You make me scream' blog award.
ReplyDeleteHappy New Year
http://cobwebbedroom.blogspot.com/2011/01/you-make-me-scream-award.html
>Also, I need a hobby other than looking for plot holes in pre-code horror comics!
ReplyDeleteHaha... it's a dirty job Gumba, but somebody's gotta do it!
>Man-o-man do I just LOVE that cover!
Daddy-O agrees!
>I have just awarded your fantastic blog a 'You make me scream' blog award.
Why thank you Paul! I feel very honored... I've been a big fan of your blog for a long time too.
Were I a doctor confronted by what seemed to be an ambulatory corpse, I'd like to think that I'd confront the situation as would a scientist, or as a healer who had to assume that the patient was alive despite some appearances. But perhaps I would instead flee. However, in either case, it doesn't seem to me that I would respond to the subject with “You fool!”
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, maybe Dr Ames had seen this sort of thing previously, and had a more sound basis for such behavior than one might think.
I'll chime in with Mitchell and Daddy-O. I guess the earlier stories came before I began routinely following the cover links, because I don't remember ever seeing this beauty before--the mustard yellow, the lightbulb headed waiter with the appletinis--but it sure is a beaut. Or maybe I just forgot because I, too, am dead....
ReplyDeleteI certainly hope I don't forget all the awesome art that followed, though. Man, page three is incredible--especially that wide screen diptych in the middle. That's a pretty clever word balloon, too, subtly invoking the standard initials for "son of a bitch" while neatly operating within accepted media norms by operating within those parentheses. There is no way on Earth that wasn't just as premeditated as the rest of the action in the panel. It's fun to notice when these comics guys are entertaining themselves.
Do you have art credits available for the Fifth Corpse. Looks like early Andru and Esposito to me.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the posts.
>But perhaps I would instead flee.
ReplyDeletePretty sure I'd be one of the fleeing kind, Dan.
>clever word balloon, too, subtly invoking the standard initials for "son of a bitch"
Haha, I didn't even notice that... awesome observation Mr.C!
>Do you have art credits available for the Fifth Corpse.
If they're not at GCD then I don't really know either, Bob... though Andru and Esposito sound like good possibilities!
Thanks for the comments!
OH THAT IS SWEET! I LOVE THE COVER!!
ReplyDelete