When you're addicted to horror comics...
Tuesday, January 14, 2020
Dead Right!
We'll stick with the strange and suspenseful stories for a few more posts, and here's one by good 'ol Steve Ditko from the May 1954 issue of Strange Suspense Stories #18. I've had a few requests for more precode Ditko, so here ya's go with one of his most eerie entries ever-- a sort of encore presentation of it in case you didn't see our reprint in Haunted Horror #29.
When you're addicted to horror comics...
When you're addicted to horror comics...
What can one say, Ditko was a prince of pen and paper, his horror work in his early years still holds up well all these years later. Even when his horror work was more cartoony than menacing it still was quality.
ReplyDeleteGreat story and great art by one of the masters of horror comics.
I've noticed a lot of Ditko horror stories, at least the ones I've read, don't have happy endings; they are usually not revenge stories but stories of endless cycles, or just people being killed by evil beings (the morality of this one is a little sticky as you could say the devil started it with the zap.). Yes, I count zombie revenge as a happy ending!
ReplyDeleteThe art is great pre-code Ditko. I like Ditko when he was more cartoon-y, I don't think it would have worked in Spider-man, for instance, but here it works great. Mr. Mord works so much better as an unrealistic stretched figure. Very strong characterization on Sam & Karl (Sam especially with the long face.). Also got to give a thumbs up and the good negative space with the black cat.
Page 4, panel 2 is a great use of camera angle, that hold page is very Ditko. 15 or so years later panel 5 wouldn't be out of place in a Dr. Strange book.
Coloring is uniformly great!
Thank you Mr.K., that is one beautifully disfigured face. I am a Ditko fan, especially his "Dr. Strange" work. This was very nice. I certainly can relate to the cartoon at the end. Any vacation as a kid for me involved buying comics.
ReplyDeleteWow, clearly not even Ditko could compete with the power of killer ape arms, haha... okay, another Charlton classic up next, see ya in a few
ReplyDeleteThe editor has wild mood swings ...
ReplyDeletePage 3: "We're running a newspaper ... not a horror magazine!"
The very next panel, "Get an interview with the killer and plenty of gory pictures ..."
I also love this early Ditko stuff. At this stage of his career I find him a bit reminiscent of Chester Gould or maybe Bill Finger--constructing his grotesquerie out of discreet organic parts (cheeks, brows, veins, insomniac lower eyelids) instead of the dynamic anatomical outlines that usually serve in comics. But still there is something about the guy, his dedication to constant discovery, that kept him ahead of everybody else from the very beginning. And is this just me? I feel like his art often improves throughout the story, as if he careened from panel to panel at a devilish pace, only really warming up somewhere after the first page or two.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, wonderful stuff. I love all of page four, but especially that middle row. I also love the cover, in no small part because I can't tell what's actually going on there.
PS, Oh yeah, and that baboon cat! Holy moley! Ditko's at his best when he's at his weirdest for sure.
ReplyDelete