I like these two pre-Code horror stories for various reasons. The first, “Was He Dead?” from Avon’s
Eerie #3 (1951), is a murdered-spouse-returns-from-the-dead story. In a few days I will show a Graham Ingels story where I will expound further on this theme, but for now suffice it to say this is a not-untypical example of that type of horror comic story, with nice yet derivative art by Moe Marcus and Rocke Mastroserio. It’s derivative in that some panels are borrowed from the style of Johnny Craig and Craig’s dripping sweat, as well as some inking inspired by Wallace Wood. A big plus is it’s got a bikini-clad babe!
“The Walking Dead” appeared in
Web of Evil #12 (1954), and the artist is unidentified. You’ll recognize immediately that it is a zombie story with a borrowed twist: the zombie is a giant because the story is inspired by
King Kong. That classic movie was re-released to theaters in 1952 and was a big box office success all over again, so it was aped (ho-ho) by several comic book scripters. (See the link below today’s two stories.)
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More on the 1952
King Kong re-release in this posting from nearly two years ago:
