Nope, it's not your imagination, --and you're not dreaming it! It's also not a premonition, even though it actually is, but what I mean to say is that we're looking at stories from the unbearably yellowed pages of the January 1954 issue of Weird Mysteries #8-- and yep, here's another one to make you pull your hair outta your head in macabre screaming madness! Hope everyone's having a splendid Friday the 13th too!
I like how the disaster that strikes seems realistic and nature related. Then the devils show up! Hilarious. Also love how the father is way too calm about the explosion that occurred on the other side of town. Granted, the ending kind of explains why. Wonder if they caused it to begin with, if they're secretly demons all along or if the actual parents were killed and replaced with some demonic doppelgangers.
ReplyDeleteOn the splash page, the witch image would make a great Halloween decoration.
ReplyDeleteThis is one of those tales where we get most, but not all, of the information- was the plan of the demons to wipe out everyone and replace them with duplicates? Had the town sold its collective soul a century ago for prosperity?
Was this a version of the red scare, where you don't know if your neighbors are one of us or on 'their' side?
What fate awaits Alan once he gets home?
This was a tale where the reader had to decide the backstory and the fate of Alan, a pre 'choose your own adventure' story.
As always, thanks for the post.
OK that picture of the witch host -- whatever her name is -- got a LOT of use in this issue! It's the same paste up job on every story, and there's a version with a hand used on "I killed Mary" but basically the same image.
ReplyDeleteIt's kind of sad that they didn't let the artist draw their own version of the host but I suspect it's because they were just all inventory stories and the company just pulled them to fill whatever book was coming out that week.
This one is more of a post-code type story where it hints at mayhem and then pulls the rug out from under us. Being pre-code, I was kind of assuming there's a missing page and, as noted above, the parent pull off their masks and "ha ha we are devils!" But, sadly, no! Everything worked out at the end!
Maybe it's one of those stories about apathy? -
ReplyDeleteAs in "Thank Heavens it happened on the other side of town!"
I love concentric psionic radiation so much I kind of wish they'd foregone pasting the witch head into this one. At least the provided me with a distraction: The story is clearly set at summer school (no shame from me! I can't say I never had to go), and yet we can clearly see Santa flying across the full moon. Flip the page and this guy's hometown is revealed as one of those little elfin villages overgrown with Christmas trees.
ReplyDeleteI thing the second and third pages of this thing are my favorite precode artwork I've seen all year. Maybe since longer. This just pushes all of my buttons. The well thought out vision of seismic destruction, the swarm of busy devils wreaking havoc, even that woman's expression in the middle of page three: "Cheesus, can you believe this ish?" It's all glorious.
And of course the tail ending. Don't we all suspect, deep down, that the world is filled with demons wearing the skins of our loved ones? Just me?
>I was kind of assuming there's a missing page and, as noted above, the parent pull off their masks and "ha ha we are devils!" But, sadly, no!
ReplyDeleteTell me you didn't look closely at the final panel without telling me you didn't look closely at the final panel
Oh lordy I completely missed that!
DeleteHell, yeah, you did haha
ReplyDeleteSo... do those devils just want an American pie type homelife with a son and all? Or is there more dire plans ahead for their dear boy? Makes me wonder.
ReplyDelete