Friday, October 31, 2008

Witch of Death (+CONTEST!)

Happy Hallowe’en everyone--- our day has finally arrived! I hope each and every one of you has a seriously safe, yet horrifyingly bloody good time tonight. I also hope the two stories I post today help get you even further into the spooky spirit of things. And we kick it off with a witchy tale from the May 1954 issue of Web of Evil #14. If this one doesn’t set your All Hallow’s mood and mind frame to HORROR OVERLOAD then the Lou Cameron story that follows most definitely will. Enjoy!











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***THOIA HALLOWEEN 2008 CONTEST!***Kind of a last minute concept I threw together here, but what the Hell… it’s Hallerin! And as long as you all have on your costumes today/tonight, how’s about you and a friend snap a pic of yourself all dolled-up together and send it to me? But there is a twist. And the reason I mention a friend is because of this:

See the THOIA banner up there at the top of my blog with the skeleton choking the lady? Yeah?

YOU MUST RECREATE THAT SCENE IN YOUR COSTUMES.
And FYI: You don’t have to be a skeleton. Or a lady. You don’t even have to be choking someone. But you do have to be doing something horrific in your costume to the other person. So come on everybody, just do it. Kill your friend and send me the pic. You know you’re going to be in your costume anyway, just have fun and do it--- kill--- Kill--- KILL!! Extra consideration awarded to: Any degree of serious bloodshed, decapitations and mutilations, Satanism, nudity, or basically anything that would be deemed as “Seducing the Innocent.” The winner and victim both get a THOIA shirt and some additional extra surprises (still to be determined.) And as a bonus the winners will also be the guest star of my banner all next week!

Contest starts anytime on Halloween, and ends on Sunday night, November 2nd, so basically you have all weekend to put something together and email it to me at karswell@hotmail.com

One final detail: Who wants to play judge?
UPDATE: Mike Howlett, author of the forthcoming WEIRD WORLD OF EERIE PUBLICATIONS book, has graciously offered his judgemental services for our Halloween 2008 Costume Murderathon. All photos you send to me will be forwarded to him where he will make his final choice by midnight November 2nd. Winner will be announced the following day, and my banner will be updated with your most splendid atrocity act. I also want to extend a permanent invitation to everyone who can't get a photo in by Sunday night (like if you're doing an old school style photo developement drop off at Walgreens or something) that you can send a Halloween photo to me anytime, as I too will be forever judging and offering special runner up prizes until Doomsday.
Good luck, have fun, and kill with style!
---Karswell

13 comments:

Prof. Grewbeard said...

Karswell, i think this story was a form of witchcraft that you perpetrated in order to kill us all, or at least all our brain cells!

you're trying to form a zombie army, aren't you?...

Anonymous said...

Her "fiancee"? In 1954 same-sex marriage would have been quite something! Pre-code indeed!

Unknown said...

I like that this had a rational explanation instead of random evil death just for the heck of it.

AndyDecker said...

Ookay, didn´t see the Scooby Doo ending coming. Nice twist.

Still, what a horrible family :-)

Anonymous said...

I enjoyed my favorite phrase being thrown out "you will rue the day!" and also I loved the spineless Clement with his bright green suit and yellow car.

Anonymous said...

"Come back, my weak-spined son!" "Sorry, Dad, I just remembered some books I have to return to the library!"

Emby Quinn said...

I had a giggle at the "I love my dead gay son!" moment right before old man Duncan gets a lungful of poison smoke. ^.^

Andy's right--the whole family was wretched. And...is it just my morbid imagination, or does it look like Dick's ghost is coming after Dora and the doctor in that last panel?

Anonymous said...

BEING A WEB OF EVIL STORY I KIND OF FIGURED THIS ONE WOULDN'T HAVE A REAL SUPERNATURAL ENDING THOUGH I GUESS THE FINAL PANEL IS SORT OF...... BUT THIS ONE WAS STILL COOL AS HELL AND I LOVED THE SPOOKY SENSE OF SET UP ON THE FIRST FEW PAGES. HELL, EVEN AN UNMASKING STORY ON HALLOWEEN MAKES FOR A GREAT POST AS WE ALL GET DRESSED UP FOR TONIGHT TOO.

LOOKING FORWARD TO SEEING SOME OF THE CONTEST SUBMISSIONS TOO! IF YOU DONT HAVE A JUDGE MAYBE YOU CAN JUST POST THEM ALL AND LET YOUR READERS VOTE?

suzanne said...

Great Scott!!! It was the reporter all along . . . didn't see it coming . . . until that scar was mentioned. Hmmmm . . .

Anonymous said...

Yes, the ending was truly unexpected. But it did make sense (kind of). I was wondering the whole time why the witch didn't off her – or his – victims by using, well, witchcraft. I guess Clement was the only exception – what the hell was up with that magic mirror anyway?

Oh, and before I forget it:
SPOOOOKY HALLOWEEN, EVERYONE!

John Rozum said...

Happy Halloween!

Thanks for all the great horror comics. I'm looking forward to taking a large part of next week to read through all the ones I didn't have time to.

Anonymous said...

I could be wrong, but I believe the cover of the Web of Evil issue is illustrated by Reed Crandall.

Mr. Karswell said...

>I could be wrong, but I believe the cover of the Web of Evil issue is illustrated by Reed Crandall.

Nope, yer totally right. In fact the guy on the top left is one of my favorite Reed characters--- Ken Shannon!