It's always weird when I discover a story that I actually published in one of my books 10 years ago (aka DEVIL TALES) but has yet to ever be posted here at THOIA. I honestly have no idea how that happens, and happens it does. But this damned 'n doomed Dick Beck and Art Gates pair-up from the Nov. '53 issue of Adventures into the Unknown #49 is not only a good / inconsequencial example of when Mr. Karswell pulls a blog boner blunder, --it also still fits right in rather nicely with THOIA's Halfway to Halloween / Walpurgisnacht shindig happenin' in just a few days, anyway-- so whatev!
5 comments:
So Frankie loved his wife and killed only gangsters - why does he go to hell, again? If I were in charge he'd have a suite reserved in heaven.
Infernal laws of the universe, since when does ol' scratch follow laws?
Boll should have stayed down below and sent word to his wife he had to take an unexpected trip for his health.
In this one, the horned one is bending over backwards for Boll. Its strange seeing the infernal one playing fair, but he might have decided to do a good deed just to see what it feels like, just as he did with the perfume formula posted here Feb 28, 2023.
Or like "George" in the movie BEDAZZLED. He likes Stanley so much he gives him his soul back, partly just to show he can have that attitude.
This story also reminds me of the THRILLER episode "The Devil's Ticket."
In that one, the "Faust" character manages to trick the Devil with a loophole, but (even though she isn't pictured as stupid) his wife accidentally ruins it for him.
Page two, panel four, the Devil's like: "You, Frankie, have to go and kill all the evil gangsters you know just so they won't repent and cheat me out of--" Hey, wait a minute! Loose lips sink ships, Ole Scratch. I guess if I were Frankie I would have nodded right along, yeah, yeah, Satan, sure, whatever you say, and then headed right straight back up to Earth and repented very first thing. Couple more slip-ups like that, and maybe next election year we get a new Satan.
I like the ideographic lightening bolts and flames we see during that tour of hell's tortures on page five. And all the smoke throughout this story looks like the sort of aroma you might see coming off Pepé Le Pew's tail end. That gives the whole thing a rather jocular feeling I really dig. I also approve of how Frankie really does look like Sinatra in most of these panels.
HAPPY WALPURGISNACHT in the PACIFIC.
This is a really interesting devil. He doesn't trick Frankie, as a matter of fact, he is actually keeping is bargain pretty much to the letter, no tricks. Frankie instead screws himself over!
It's a real change of pace; but at the same time you have to wonder if the devil didn't know this was going to happen all along and was just entertaining himself.
Frankie also absolutely screwed himself over by not mentioning cremation to this wife.
I like that the artist was clever enough to show the whip / rack tortures in the splash, before they were shown later in the script. That's some good eye for detail.
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