And once again, farewells and eternal thanks to the guy who made my life of art appreciation and comic book collecting everything-- to the greatest of the greats, the world most certainly will never be the same without you.
Friday, July 29, 2016
Murder the Lover! / Murder the Husband!
You didn't really think we'd allow the passing of legendary comic messiah, Jack Davis, to go by without posting a story, did you? CHOKE! But instead of going the all too obvious route around here with a trip to the Crypt, the Vault, or the Haunt, let's instead lure out the August - September 1952 issue of Crime SuspenStories #12 for a murderously intense, (or did I mean funny?), double blast ending tale that will either give you a real charge, or leave you feeling all wet! It's a story I've probably read 10,000 times in my life and will continue to read 10,000 more.
And once again, farewells and eternal thanks to the guy who made my life of art appreciation and comic book collecting everything-- to the greatest of the greats, the world most certainly will never be the same without you.
And once again, farewells and eternal thanks to the guy who made my life of art appreciation and comic book collecting everything-- to the greatest of the greats, the world most certainly will never be the same without you.
This two-sided tale reminds me of a choose-your-own adventure story--most of those had some pretty rotten endings where unless you were truly lucky and got a good one, you usually ended up with a pretty gruesome or miserable fate.
ReplyDeleteIn this case, either way you look at it--be you the murderous husband who's being cheated on or the deceitful "best friend" who's doing the cheating, you lose. I love the narration--and the second tale becomes even more fun when you realize that Ken is probably plotting to murder Walter at the same time.
Man I love this one. That "second" splash is especially great. But this was probably the first time I read this when I stopped cold at page three, panel six, of the first half and thought to myself: my god, those are the trees from Calvin and Hobbes, right here in the background of a pretty early Jack Davis story. Man how the legacy of excellence pays forward through the years.
ReplyDeleteThanks Mr. Karswell!
Nice little tale. The second part could be named after the Moose point of view.
ReplyDelete"The hunting problem. Solution: see those two jerks sinking".
Plus, when a husband is cuckolded we say he's got "antlers", so the moose hunting is particularly fitting here.
All the EC mags edited by Feldstein had the same kind of rhythms, but we were deep enough into the run of ECs that Al was starting to mix them up. This is a lot of fun as the two stories parallel each other in parts outside the hunting setting. It's as if both plots are going on at once.
ReplyDeleteThis tale is a lot of talking heads and text, but Davis does a great job. When given the chance, he really shines, like the moose is a great image. I'm sure he drew all these pages in 2 days, too!
One of the greats, but also, like Kirby, one of the greats that left us with an incredible amount of art.
I really loved these two classic stories from the great Jack Davis.Black humour at it's best.
ReplyDeleteThe bad side of EC - unappealing human (murder) dramas. Not what "horror" comics should be about - weird but strangely beautiful fantasies. Let's face it shall we? - EC's naivety and recklessness caused the code.
ReplyDelete