A few posts ago, a comment mentioned having to "re-read the story a few times to understand what was actually going on", and (for me anyway), the same thing applies with today's wicked vampire encounter, via the November 1952 issue of Adventures into the Unknown #37. It's still a wonderfully weird story, and I love the snooty aggressive nature and looks of the vicious vamp here. But our hapless hero, Gary Owens (not to be confused with the legendary Laugh-In announcer) continually talks about something on the first few pages that artist Pete Riss inexplicably chose not to even bother adding into the visuals. What really makes all of this even more odd is that it's even the freakin' title of the story! Or maybe I've just read this story incorrectly and missed something, who knows? Anyway, let 'ol Karswell know what you think. There are a few more vampires fluttering our way over the next couple of posts as well, so stay toodily tombed...
8 comments:
Man, Gary really likes the sound of his own voice.
Script written by Ed Wood Jr., only he could have come up with such bizarre dialog. Maybe Gary was Ed Wood Jr. himself if he left the cashmere sweater at home. I suspect cashmere is unsuited for mountain climbing.
The vampiress never heard the saying "When you are winning, shut up" as in don't tell the guy what your weakness is or how you can be destroyed. An oversight so many horrors in comics fail to learn or never learned.
Its not often we see a barefoot vampire in a horror story, its an interesting detail. Barefoot Vampire In the Park, the Romanian/Transylvanian version of that play.
Thanks for this slightly surreal vampire tale, Karswell.
This has all the base components of a simple horror story; it telegraphs the blood stone (good), it has the trick of drinking it (which is obvious but fine), it has the sexy vampire chick, our kind of milquetoast hero, but it then needs to over-explain the blood stone.
The thing that sinks it is the other vampire; they need that to explain the blood stone but a simpler version might of been she was trapped with the blood stone attached to her, he removes it as he thinks it's valuable, and we just let comic logic do the rest. As a matter of fact, I bet this was the original story.
The artist refusing to draw a damn skeleton doesn't help, as Karswell already mentioned! And where was she hiding the wings in that burial shroud? Behind the push up bra?
Yeah, the story needed a couple more passes but weirdly enough the art is great! I love the weird skull pedestal, the vampire woman is great good girl art, and everything is drawn with a good skill.
It makes me think that maybe there were some changes in the script *after* the art was done. When he finds the other skeleton on page 2? That was him finding the stone. The poor artist probably got the blame for this one! If you remove all text about the second skeleton, change the title, have the vampire lady say the stone kept her in place, it will actually work and not be confusing.
Yeah, this one’s weird. The skeleton keeps getting mentioned but we never actually see it-or the second one of the lady vampire at the end. This one is also REALLY talky. Neither Gary nor the lady vampire ever shut up for a minute. Heck, Gary isn’t just thinking his thoughts, he’s saying them out loud . I like the shot of him alone in the dark though. Also, this seems to be one of the only stories I know of where a bloodstone is the weakness for destroying a vampire.
Ok good, so it’s not just my imagination! I seriously read this thing twice and felt like I was supposed to understand some implication connection between the giant skull rock formation and the idea of skeletal remains in a hole.
It annoys me in almost any story when a technicality - as opposed to something BIG - wrecks things for a character. In this case, Gary taking out the stone in public and accidentally tossing it like a coin!
No matter how far-fetched it is, this story deserves credit for taking a miserable mistake like that and turning it around -
You accidentally tossed your bloodstone under a train's wheels? Then gather the powder and make a potion from it!
I used to read stories like this and be blown away by the artificiality of the main character narrating all the events. I know it took some time for thought bubbles to appear in the course of comics development, and then for writers to adopt them (and now it has gone out of fashion again, in favor of thought captions, which have kind of helped kill off omniscient storytelling in comics, but I digress). But now, fifteen years into watching people livestream their every activity, after watching people chatting into their invisible Bluetooth devices on the train, etc., I just take this stuff in stride. This dude's mountain climbing channel got a really strange reel today, I guess. I hope this post went viral.
It is so totally strange that the artist chose not to draw the skeleton. It seems like that would be the most fun part of this story to draw. And clearly Pete Riss was itching to pack spooky skeletal forms into the very landscape. So maybe it was an editorial decree? Maybe there was no way to cheat the skeleton wings in such a way that readers could imagine our podcaster had missed them the first look--back when he was actually reaching into the dude's ribcage--but seen them clearly later? Maybe they felt like it was too much of a spoiler for the top of page two. I don't know, but it's a shame.
What the dude did draw was quite nice, though. The big red wings put me in mind of Basil Wolverton, but this art doesn't feel at all derivative to me. I like the fine woodcut-style shadow hatchings on the faces and shrouds. And I absolutely love all the spooky igneous detail in those rock formations.
>I hope this post went viral.
Haha, as viral as a plague of vampires! Speaking of, we have another hot vampire on the way to master you all! Stay tombed...
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