We're shifting our gruesome gears for a bit and diving head 'n neck first into a week or so dedicated to Atlas precode horror now, --and by many numerous requests, I might add too! And the June 1952 issue of Suspense #19 is a good place to start, with a perfectly putrid love story that is sure to leave you definitely drained in The End. And boy oh boy, Jim Mooney sure could drawn one marvelous man-eater, eh? She almost looks like a Johnny Craig cutie in that ferocious, final panel...
6 comments:
I love how fat seems to be equated with health and blood in this comic. I don't know if fat was considered healthy back then but it's a laugh from a 21st century perspective.
Can't really feel sorry for Healy. Shouldn't have murdered his yakity yak wife, just given her some kind of medication to seal up her vocal cords forever. I mean, medicine is pretty much magic on these tales, right?
The art is better than it has any right to be in a story this silly.
I love this one. You can take it apart and come up with a lot of alternate themes from it.
First off, "... and he didn't bat an eye!" is a great bit.
This is another story where you can see the ending coming a mile away; if she's a vampire or a witch or a demon it doesn't matter, she's a man-killer and she's on the lookout for another victim, and our chubby doctor is the right fit. The fun is watching him make mistake after mistake and finally get what is actually just deserts; he killed his own wife!
There in lies the fun theme, though. To me, it's very much a "be happy with what you got" because attempting to move up in the world and you find out the grass is always bloodier on the other side of the hill. But at the same time, you could read this as "all women are terrible, they either nag you or are black widows." Or you could even take this as a metaphor for STDs and hot ladies.
I doubt the author was thinking of all this but I love the connotations of this story.
Maybe a lot of people saw that ending coming - either a vampire or something similar.
But it's kind of original that Ben is absolutely sure about Harry's situation, so it turns into euthanasia instead of Ben "just" putting him out of the way. It even makes the story a little controversial.
(It would be twice as controversial with no murder of Margaret.)
Do I need to point out why I find the name of the doctor's friend to be so funny? Especially in an Atlas comic which would eventually become Marvel? Yep, Peter Parker's best friend and the son of Norman Osborn. Granted, this one has a slight spelling difference in his last name. I think my favorite panel in this story is 5th panel of the fourth page where Ben basically poisons his wife. The narration makes it so darkly humorous. Also, I love how even before the rather obvious reveal of Alice being a vampire, there are panels that make her look really terrifying, such as panel 4, of page 3, and the first two panels of the last page. (the completely white Alice and the shadows upon her face are rather chilling looking) Yet, while Ben keeps describing himself as "fat", I don't really see it. At least, not to the usual comic portrayal of a "fat" person in a comic. He seems fairly normal to me.
Hearing Ben being referred to as fat, it reminds me of a poster of Curly Howard with the caption reading "Not that fat-by today's standards"
In this day and age Ben would be considered overweight, not fat.
As far as Alice is concerned, she never learned the lesson 'don't kill the golden goose', or at least go out for a bite now and then while Hubby regains his health.
I sure do like it when comics illustrators draw fine art into their interiors, and Mooney does not disappoint. I love the ornately framed Wyeth-style pastoral farmhouse in the splash, the first of several spots in this story where the colorist has taken the bravura tack of leaving something stark white (see also the second panel on page three). Another piece of art, in a different frame, can be found in the same bedroom spot throughout the rest of the story. Mooney keeps giving, though, leaving no wall unadorned. It's such a dedicated nod to lived-in verisimilitude that I almost didn't even notice.
The characters are too fraught--too mad, monstrous, or preyed upon--for this everyday verisimilitude. They all shamble around the pages with their eyes widened in shock, their pupils dilated with insanity, their mouths agape. The colorist furthers all this gothic sensibility too: Glowworm mentions several panels where the colors make Alice look like a marauding lunatic, my fave being the top of the last page, where her crazy eyes and ghastly pallor spread to Ben over the two panels.
But Ben doesn't need any outside crazy. Look at his face in every panel of page four, especially that forlorn yellow portrait at the top there, the panel where you can see his mind snap. Shudder.
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