Even as we enter into the month of November, there are many macabre ways to keep the spirit of Halloween alive! For one, how about another spooky story set on Halloween! I actually had this Al Williamson horror adventure gem planned for last night, (could you have even handled a triple terror feature, though?!), but thought everyone would appreciate a little bit more All Hallows evil today too, what with the 'ol mundane, new month boos blues settin' in. From the gnarly November - December 1951 issue of Forbidden Worlds #3.
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I always enjoy ACG's horror comics because they usually come up with some creative spin on a common theme-in this case, revenge, skulls and robbery. It's fun how what begins as an innocent kid touching something of his dad's that he shouldn't be playing around with to begin with is what sets off the events of this one. Oddly enough, the part about Davey's mother marrying Robert for his money really isn't necessary. They could have gone with any woman at that party to decide to dance with the mysterious chap in the robes. I can't help but laugh at the term "Dalai Rama" here. They were obviously going off of the Dalai Lama but didn't want to offend anyone by using the actual title. Also Kali is an actual Hidu goddess but the statue here is clearly male.
I like the art and story in this one, and the fact the doomed adventurer knew what he should have done, namely keep the skull in a fireproof safe. We don't usually see someone in a horror/adventure tale do some critical thinking.
I don't know why, but I have a feeling this tale was lifted or modified from Weird Tales Magazine, it has that extra something that elevates this story from many horror comics tales.
Oh dear, the first two panels of Page 4 have aged like milk left in a car in Florida in the summer.
Darn, I forgot to mention that November First is All Souls Day. Think of it as New Years Day for Halloween, the day after but still worth celebrating as Halloween part two.
So at EC Williamson didn't do a lot of horror work (maybe a handful of stories?) he was mostly relegated to the sci-fi comics which was good while he could draw horror great, I think the other horror artist at EC were better suited for it.
The art here is great, from the walls of the temples to suburban homes, manly man art (I mean shooting a poor defenseless monk is as manly man as we get) -- excellent. It never screamed horror to me, though. I know I'm probably in a minority here but Williamson -- dinosaurs, space ships, aliens, great. Horror, just good.
That said, this is a fun little tale. There's a whole lot of rules to this revenge and they all get checked off and then our jerk gets his well deserved fate. I feel sorry for the kid! He's stuck with a gold digging mother and he knows that he sealed his father's fate!
As an "oriental" myself, this is so hilariously bad that it became awesome. I didn't know we had "elongated eye sockets", I laughed aloud at the "Dalai Rama", and as for Kali, she's a Hindu goddess. I'm still grinning at it all.
I've come to the conclusion that Halloween is no longer scary. All kids dress up as these days are either superheroes or video game characters. This year I didn't see a single "scary" costume. That said, my city has a pretty heavy Indian immigrant population, so I'm always happy to see their kids dressed up and out trick or treating, so at least the tradition is still alive and well.
Later on she would play a big part in HELP! with the Beatles, which of course is partly a sendup of this kind of story.
It's funny how they keep trying to make him a little complicated.
He has the nerve to be offended that his wife married him for money, in spite of how he got it.
But then he sounds genuinely concerned about his son's welfare.
Then there's the two cops' very detached attitude about why they need to protect him, like some funny extra detail.
I'll admit that I'm not the biggest Al Williamson fan. When I was a kid I was not into his obsession with fine lines over forms, and as an adult I'm too keenly hip to this reliance on a bag of tricks he mostly got from uber-influencer Alex Raymond. I don't mean that Williamson is more derivative than anyone else--he's definitely not--and he's quite an amazingly sophisticated illustrator, to boot. It's just that if you try to ignore Raymond's shadow, and all the overlap with the rest of the Fleagles (especially Wallace and Roy), I don't find I'm really a fan of whatever's leftover.
But I do love this little glimpse into what a Flash Gordon Halloween Special would have looked like. Holy cats, pages three and four are great! During a luscious holiday costume gala at Ming's palace, Flash is somehow discovered in his clever Buck Rogers disguise (see dyed hair), and must evade the fiendish clutches of his merciless enemy after Dale is captured by the freakish skull guards!
It's a flight of fancy, but it thrills me.
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