Friday, July 18, 2014
Hoax / The Sea - Its Givings... and Takings!
I had a creepy chap write-in looking for a 70's comic he remembers as a lad but he couldn't recall any details other than it featured "a sea monster made out of barrels", and another story about a "hot mermaid." Pretty sure he's looking for the August 1975 issue of Monster Hunters #1, --and if this ain't the one I'll eat a hot mermaid! And fyi: the art on the hot mermaid tale is by Pete Morisi, many of you THOIA followers may be familiar with his awesome precode horror and crime work, so check the archives for more-- in fact, check out his Sewer Monsters tale HERE!
Monster Hunters #1 ( along with Creepy Things #1) were tow of my favorites since childhood....
ReplyDeleteThe short bit with the "Countess" was enjoyable......
"Vat now ? A stake through mine heart ?"....
England, then Tibet, then back to Scotland? Was he trying to rack up frequent flier miles?
ReplyDeleteThe mermaid story, aside from the art and the pretty mermaid is pretty much forgettable, but the first is a gem, because it takes a pretty old and hacked twist ending and does something new with it.
The art is also interesting, it's relatively stark and inked incredibly heavily, but it works very well. And while it's a "hoax searcher discovers the real thing" story, the addition of "it was a decoy" elevates the ending. A real nice story.
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ReplyDeleteMan, those first four panels of Hoax (after the splash) are absolutely marvelous! That's some muscular, monster-fightin' Dirty Harry-like action, right there. I could stand a lot more eye-rolling no-nonsensing two-fisted debunking just like this in my fiction. Not that this guy's the very brightest bulb on the tree. I mean, who goes from England to Scotland by way of East Asia?
ReplyDelete@Mestiere -- you know what's great about comics and art in general? How two people can have such conflicting opinions about something!
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ReplyDeleteI agree about that first scene. It's hard to tell whether the writer was picking on England or America. Or both. Either way, the end of this scene gives him a real "hard edge," with that "Now if you'll excuse me, I have a plane to catch" line.
ReplyDeleteHe does an about-face in the second part by CAPTURING the bear, even though it has the same kind of record as the fake werewolf.
I kind of liked the mermaid story. Maybe I've read too many COMEDY comic books, but I almost expected those two fish to be LAUGHING during the ending.
>If you don't know about Nessie then you are a crappy monster hunter, John.
ReplyDeleteObviously he's just playing hard to get with her in this panel, and / or not yet wanting to let on that he's a monster hunter. Both stories contain a nice thread of comedy in them that is quite refreshing-- thanks again to Brendan who wrote in and requested these as I haven't dug out this issue in years and it was fun to revisit. I think we'll take a look at another 70's Charlton debut classic in our next post as well, stay tombed... and as always, thanks for the comments!
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ReplyDeleteHaving spent some time in Tibet, I can assure you the housing depicted here bears no relation to the yak-dunk habitation I experiences.
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