About a year a half ago, Marvel announced that they were doing a new series featuring a female vampire slayer who was the daughter of Blade. I have always been a big horror comics fan, and it was one of the only new marvel series that I was truly looking forward to (other than Howard the Duck.) I am still waiting. With Marvel’s terrible record of supernatural characters, I should have known there would be a hitch. The series has been repeatedly postponed, and now I suppose it is cancelled. Instead we are getting a 15 year old African American Ironman (ho hum).
Of course no one should be surprised. Marvel has a long history of treating their supernatural characters shabbily. They have weakened them, made them into punching bags or sidekicks for Deadpool and basically treated them as humorous, unthreatening villains as if they were in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.
Recently the current lord of hell (sometimes dubbed the son of Satan) Damien Hellstorm was defeated (or an almost exact duplicate was easily defeated) by Peter Parker’s old buddy, Flash Thompson in a venom costume. Later on he became a comic heavy in his ex-wife’s series Hellcat. The lord of the vampires, Dracula (he used to be one of the most formidable supernatural characters in the whole Marvel universe) was recently defeated by Spiderwoman wielding a hammer. Also before the siege of Asgard, the hood run villain group beat up the werewoman, tigra and kept her quiet by threatening the life of her mom.
Now a little about horror comics history. The Golden era for horror and supernatural comics was definitely during the 50s. The EC comics company published some of the best horror books ever at the time including Tales from the Crypt, Vault of Horror, and Haunt of Fear featuring some of the all-time best horror artists such as Graham Engels, Wally Wood, Johnny Craig, Jack Davis, Al Feldstein, George Evans, Jack Kamen, Harvey Kurtzman, Al Williamson, Joe Orlando, Reed Crandall, Bernard Krigstein, Will Elder, Fred Peters, Howard Larsen, and Jack Davis. Some of these artists went on to do some good work for Warren and Marvel (Wally Wood did a classic Daredevil/Submariner battle issue) later on, but many did their best work for EC. Look for my interview with 8 Fears, an artist who was influenced by EC artists (especially ghastly) in an upcoming issue of Kilter. My friend 8 Fears is a big EC comics fan and it influenced his art (look for the interview in a future Kilter.)
I know I am getting off the subject but Papercutz Comics is going to put out a new series of Tales from the Crypt books this year, and the creators will include writers Gerry Conway, David Anthony Kraft, Stefan Petrucha and artists Robert Hack and Miran Kim will produce three tales for terror.
Then the comics code came authority came in and ruined horror comic- ending the 50s horror explosion. The quack psychologist Frank Wertham wrote the book, Seduction of the Innocent which he blamed such societal ills as youth violence, homosexuality (which hardly any sane person thinks of as an ill anymore) and juvenile delinquency so the graphic but creative horror comics were censored out of existence and replaced with sterile and toothless mystery and monster comics. A few significant characters emerged from the Marvel mystery books including Fin Fang Foom (who will be at the center of the new Monsters Unleased event), Groot (currently in the Guardians of the Galaxy) and the much maligned Dr. Druid (he started out as Dr. Droom.)
The comic’s code authority seal of approval was supposedly voluntary but some venders would not carry non code approved comics at their stores. Warren published magazine size black and white comics (Eerie, Creepy and Vampirella), so since they were the size of magazines and they were displayed alongside Playboy rather than Archie, they were technically considered magazines and not comics so they could get around the comics code restrictions. Soon the Eerie company (who often retold old horror stories with more gore) and Skywald were putting out similar magazines such as Witch’s Tales Devilina and Hellrider which was prototype for the future Ghost Rider.)
In 1971, Stan Lee (along with artist Gil Kane) helped turned the tide on the censorship issue by openly defying it. Drugs were becoming a big problem for the youth, and a part of the federal government asked Lee to write an antidrug comic story to help fight the drug problem. In one of the most memorable Marvel comics storylines of the ‘60s, Spiderman’s best friend Harry Osbourne (he only knows Spiderman in his Peter Parker identity) takes some kind of illegal drug and almost dies.
Under the Comics Code there could be no depiction of illegal drug use. Spiderman #96-98 came out with no seal of approval. When Lee’s great antidrug story was a big hit, it embarrassed the hell out of the comics code people because it was smart, relevant and clearly anti-drug. At DC, Denny O’ Neil wrote a similar story a little later and he went even farther. In “Snowbirds Don’t Fly” in Green Lantern/Green Arrow #96-97 Green Arrow’s partner, Speedy became a heroin addict (we never found out exactly what Harry Osbourne was on in the Spiderman books.) This was all illustrated by the Silver Age master, Neil Adams, whose art looked like it was very influenced by psychedelics.
After these two series, the Comics Code Authority was revised and comics were allowed to use horror in the title and depict the undead (but they still could not mention zombies for some reason.)
Marvel’s first dip in the horror pond was kind of cautious in Amazing Spiderman #101-102. Morbious the Living Vampire was a blood disease victim who tried to cure his affliction with a medication made from bat blood. The cure was worse than the disease, and he was transformed him into a blood sucking bat like creature that could not bear the sunlight. So even though he had many vampire like traits he was not a true vampire because he never died. But because of his blood lust he became an anti-hero foe and sometimes ally to Spiderman.
Morbious starred in his own adventures in both Adventures into Fear #20-31 (which often featured inappropriate art by Frank Robbins) and Vampire Tales (which featured much better art by Rich Buckler and Tom Sutton among others.) Morbious usually killed people more dangerous and less sympathetic than him and he successfully straddled the line between hero and villain.
Other monsters soon followed. A swamp creature dubbed the Manthing appeared in a Marvel black and white magazine titled Savage Tales in 1971, and this too technically was not a comic. The muck monster later appeared in the color comic series Astonishing Tales (written by future Swamp Thing writer, Len Wein) and illustrated by no less than Neil Adams. Manny later graduated to a regular series in Adventures into Fear until he got his own title which ran for 22 issues. Despite some respectable later Manthing tales, Steve Gerber penned the best Manthing stories and no one before or since has equaled his work. In contrast Swamp Thing at DC went through many periods of excellence.
Werewolf by night also debuted in a try out book. Although the werewolf was underpowered (one of his early foes was a hunter with no powers), the art work by Mike Ploog was terrific and many of the Conway/Wein/ Moench issues had decent writing. He was a pretty respectable character in the old days and he even performed ok in fights with Dracula (in Tomb of Dracula 18 and werewolf by night 150), Spiderman (Marvel Teamup #12), and Morbious (in Marvel Premier #28.) Oddly enough WWBK never went against Manwolf, The Beast or Wolfsbane as far as I know.
The original WWBN series lasted for 43 issues plus some Giant size issues, but the attempts to turn him into a standard hero in the ironman team up issues (n the last issues of Werewolf by Night) were pretty pathetic. Today he is an occasional guest star and resident punching bag in superhero books like Deadpool, but there have been a few revival attempts to be discussing in later blogs.
Ghost Rider also started in Marvel Spotlight, and his book was perhaps the most financially successful supernatural marvel title (the only rival is Dr. Strange) perhaps because it fused its horror with super heroics. It also had some fine artists like Mark Texeria, Xavier Saltares, Jim Starlin (in a great fill-in issue) and the before mentioned Mike Ploog. There were several Ghost Riders and several Ghost Rider series.
Son of Satan started off as a spinoff of Ghost Rider and he served as the main character in Marvel Spotlight for about a year. The early stories were unmemorable and the early depiction of the character was pretty unimpressive. But after Steve Gerber took over working often with the appealing artist Jim Mooney (unfortunately he recently committed suicide), the book became extremely weird and imaginative explorations into the nature of evil, and they probably paved the way for some of the later Vertigo characters like John Constantine and Lucifer (both of which eventually go their own TV series.) Son of Satan got his own series but it was too little too late. John Warner was unable to fill Steve Gerber’s shoes and the book was cancelled after only nine issues.
After his mandatory appearances in Marvel Two in One and Marvel Teamup, SOS was in a fine storyline in the Gerber penned Defenders, and he became one of the big stars of Defenders in a great later Marc DeMathias ‘70s run of Defenders (#92-125). Then he came back better than ever in the 90s.
Defenders also featured some other notable occult characters including the Gargoyal , a pacifistic old man stuck in a Gargoyle’s body, and Devil Slayer, a soldier of fortune who had a shadow cape from which he could pull out any weapon he needed from any dimension.
Demon Hunter, as he was originally called was created by Rich Buckler (who is one of my facebook friends) and he had his own book at the failed Atlas/Seaboard Company for one whole issue. When the company folded he returned in an interesting storyline by former rock writer, David Kraft which was influenced by the lyrics of Blue Oyster Cult recordings. Devil Slayer then became a semi regular defender and resurfaced as a Revenger a few years ago. He was also in many issues of Marvel Comics Presents.
Besides Demon Hunter/Devil Slayer, the brief Atlas line offered some other horror strips which mostly copied marvel or dc books and even hired some of the same artists.
Hellrider by Gary Friedrich and Ross Andru with its flame shooting motorcyclist was a clear precursor of Friedrich’s later marvel Ghost Rider character. Grim Ghost scripted by Michael Fleischer (whose book lasted three issues) was somewhat similar to Fleisher’s takes on the Spectre and Ghost Rider. Even though the sympathetic vampire who sometimes loses control in Fear featuring Son of Dracula (which had only one issue) was supernatural, he was also somewhat similar to Marvel’s Morbious. Bog Beast was reminiscent of the heap, manthing and swamp thing. Devilina was a direct steal of Marvel’s Satana. Satana rebelled against her father, the devil and Devilina went against the wishes of her brother, the devil.
Speaking of Satana, no character at marvel had a more unlucky failed history. The character debuted in Vampire Tales# 2 in a perfect blend of words and beautiful visual storytelling by Stan lee and John Romita Senior. The second story by Gerry Conway (Conway says he does not remember writing it) appeared in Vampire Tales #3. Spanish comics master Esteban Marota fleshed out the character and maintained the high standards but then it all went wrong. Marota’s art for the third Satana appearance was lost overseas in the mail. Gerry Conway converted it into a prose story to bridge the gap between her second and third full story and they both appeared in Vampire Tales #4. Later stories were handled by Tony Isabella and Enrique Romero (there is a great photo from a convention of Tony with a model dressed like Satana) and
Chris Claremont also did some other stories featuring her and the series jumped from Vampire Tales to Haunt of Horror where it probably fit better alongside Gabriel: Devil Hunter. Claremont and George Evans teamed up on a Satana story which was supposed to appear in Legion of Monsters magazine #2 (it was advertised in Legion of Monsters #1), but it too never came out. Her final appearance in a black and white magazine was quite effective. It was penned by Chris Claremont and drawn by the great Vincent Alcazar, and it appeared in the try-out book Marvel Preview #7.
Chris Claremont did a Satana solo story which appeared in Marvel Premier #27, which was not on the same level of quality as most of the black and white Satana strips, and he also used her in Marvel Spotlight (in which she fought her brother) and Marvel Teamup.
It was announced that Satana was going to have a regular Steve Gerber black and white magazine series with a Lilith daughter of Dracula backup series, and a Mike Fleisher series with the same name but neither one came out.
Although the Satana story was apparently finished, Claremont later introduced Rogue and Selene in the Xmen and both characters also consumed energy by kissing men. She came back with a vengeance in the 90’s.
Monster of Frankenstein was initially one of the best horror books. The Gary Friedrich/Ploog adaptation of the novel was wonderful, but the series floundered when the monster was revived in the modern age. Future Frankenstein stories were created by Doug Moench, Bill Mantlo, Val Mayerick, John Buscema and others but the quality kept declining until the inevitable cancellation. Frankenstein appeared in some atrocious tales in Marvel Teamup and Ultimate Spiderman, but of all classical Marvel horror monsters he is the one who works least well in the present. DC had several noteworthy enjoyable Frankenstein series including Spawn of Frankenstein and Frankenstein Agent of SHADE, a delightful spy adventure/parody/monster book that was prematurely cancelled.
Later on Roy Thomas and Dick Giordano produced a similarly inspired first rate adaptation of the Bram Stoker Dracula novel, but the books it appeared in kept changing and getting cancelled The first installments appeared in issues #5–8 and 10–11 of the Dracula Lives magazine in 10- to 12-page installments. Another installment occurred in Legion of Monsters magazine but that was cancelled after one promising issue. It took 30 years to complete so most of the fans of the original installments are probably dead or out of comics reading by now. Thanks Marvel.
Speaking of the lord of the vampires, the initial run Tomb of Dracula by Marv Wolfman, Gene Colan and Tom Palmer is surely the finest Marvel horror book: it was the marvel equivalent of swamp thing and no horror series marvel has done before or since can compare to it. The final sequence which had Drac’s battle for mantle of the vampires after briefly becoming human was the highlight of the seism, but it might have been even better in its original version. The resident editor idiot (I think it was Jim Shooter) prematurely cancelled the book, and Marv Wolfman had to cut around 19 pages from his epic saga and rearrange other pages to cram it into a double sized last issue,
After Dracula Lives and Tomb of Dracula comics were cancelled there was a Tomb of Dracula b/w magazine and eventually a Tomb of Dracula Epic series but both failed to fulfill expectations.
There was supposed to be a Curse of Dracula super special in color by Wolfman and Colan but (surprise surprise) Ii too failed to materialize. There was a later Dark Horse comics miniseries by Colan/Wolfman but it had a completely different take and look on the vampire king.
It was also announced that there would be a new Tomb of Dracula series by Bruce Jones (he did great work in Warren Books and Twisted Tales). But Jones signed a DC exclusive contract, and when the book came out in 2004, it was scripted by Robert Rodi and it was switched from a maxi series to a four issue miniseries and it was more about Blade than Dracula.
Mort Todd put out some reprints of classic Dracula fights against the Xmen, Dr. Stanger and the Silver Surfer and there were rumblings that there would be a new Dracula series by him but it never came out.
Glenn Greenberg penned a respectable three issue mini in which Dracula fought his daughter Liilith (more about her later) but it never became a regular series. It was illustrated by Pat Oliff and (surprise) Tom Palmer.
Stan Lee has admitted that his incredible Hulk character is basically a mix of the Frankenstein monster and Mr. Hyde. In 70s the Incredible Hulk comic was never a true horror book but the main character fought so many misshapen monsters that the book sometimes seemed like it was a monster of the week book (The Night Stalker TV series was also like that). The Hulk repeatedly fought ugly creatures like the glob, wendigo, missing link and later on he took on werewolf by night, Dracula, the Frankenstein monster (all three in Monster Sized Hulk) as well as Groot, and various ghost riders several times . Later on the Red Hulk who used to be Thunderbolt Ross teamed with the Legion of Monsters.
There were some other interesting series and individual issues such as Man wolf (produced by Perez Kraft in Creatures on the Loose and Marvel Spotlight) which morphed into a sci-fi sword and sorcery book, the Neil Adams Dracula Lives origin story, the Monsters Unleashed solo stories featuring Tigra and Wendigo, Tigra by Byrne in Marvel Chillers, and most of the Steve Gerber stories were lively and imaginative. The rest of the 70s horror tales were often inconsistent with several writer/artist changes a year.
In the 70s Marvel put out a whole slew of black and white horror books such as Dracula Lives (it featured Dracula tales from both the past and present), Vampire Tales (starring Morbious), Monsters Unleased (with a rotating cast including Manthing and the Frankenstein monster among others, (Haunt of Horror featuring Satana and Gabriel Hunter) and Tales of the Zombie which was perhaps the best one (with creepy scripts by Steve Gerber and sinister art by Pablo Marcos). The Marvel black and white magazines were often inferior to Warren’s works and they were padded with too many reprints, but they did help expose some fine foreign born artists to Americans such as the Pilipino invasion figures (who tended to work cheaper than American artists) such as Sonny Trinidad, Vincent Alcazar, Alfredo Alcala, Nestor Redondo and Alex Nino. My fav was a non-Filipino named Pablo Marcos.
Blade the Vampire Slayer was introduced as part of the stellar supporting cast in Tomb of Dracula, and he had a few solo tales in Vampire tales plus a try-out comic named Marvel Preview, and some of them were done by the Filipino artist, Tony DeZugio.
Modred the mystic, a character was not quite a hero yet not quite a villain was in a few issues of Marvel Chiller until he became showed up in Marvel Two in One , Avengers, and Darkhold (in which he was pretty heroic.) He was in two cool but poorly illustrated battle issues in the 90s darkhold mag in which he fought a possessed Blade and Dr. Strange.
The former cat Tigra became a sexy adversary for the Werewolf by Night before starred in a short run of issues in Marvel Chillers. She eventually joined the Avengers and later gave birth to a skull baby but she has mostly been relegated to a supporting of side character.
The original Bloodstone debuted in a color comic, made a few cameos then he was killed off by Steve Gerber in a Rampaging Hulk magazine backup feature. His daughter and later his son took on his name and weapons. His daughter’s best moments came when she was a member of Warren Ellis’s delightfully wacky Agents of HARM. The original monster hunter, Bloodstone teamed up with Dr. Druid and some other Timely/early marvel characters as the Monster Hunters in a Roger Stern penned book in the 90s.
The Scarecrow is an interesting minor character with a brief but tangled history which is somewhat typical of many marvel supernatural characters. He had the misfortune of appearing at the end of the 70’s monster craze (which lasted from 1973-76) so he never gained much traction. Scott Edelman and Rico Rical created the scarecrow (his name was later changed to strawman so he would not conflict with marvel’s other scarecrow character.) He was initially supposed to appear in Monsters Unleased and Giant Size Werewolf but they were both cancelled. He first appeared in Dead of Night #11, but then that book was cancelled. He was supposed to appear in his own series but it never came out. He returned for one issue in Marvel Spotlight #26 and the story was concluded many years later in a team up with the thing in Marvel Two in One #18. He was used well many years later in Dr. Strange where he appeared as a fear lord.
Three dinosaurs had their chance in the spotlight in the late ‘70s. Fin Fang Foom is a fun but ridiculous pre superhero monster character who crossed over into modern marvel comics. He was initially a dragon like alien who wanted to conquer the world and because of the comic code’s stand on nudity, he had to wear underpants. He later remerged as a foe for a monster sized statue in the It the Living Colossus in Strange Tales and he later fought Ironman (several times), the legion of night, and the incredible hulk.
After all the black and white magazines were cancelled and Legion of Monsters came out, and it was supposed to feature all the monsters from the old b/w mages and it was going to print some of their inventory stories. The first issue had another great Neil Adams cover and it featured a fairly interesting and tragic Doug Moench/Val Mayerick Frankenstein Monster story that took place at a costume party, another installment in the Thomas/Giordano Dracula novel adaptation, and the beautifully drawn (art by Dave Cockrum) introduction of Manphibian, an alien who resembled the Creature from the Black Lagoon. Manphibian was in limbo for a long time but he eventually came back in Frankencastle, Howling Commandos, Red Hulk and a later Legion of Monsters miniseries.
The second issue was supposed to supposed to contain a Morbious the Living Vampire tale, a satanna story by Chris Claremont and George Evans, an another installment in the Dracula novel adaptation. It never came out.
Lilith, the daughter of Dracula was Marvel’s attempt to replica Warren’s success with Vampirella. Her books had extremely sexy covers by people like Earl Norem. The interior stories by Steve Gerber and various artists like Gene Colan and Bob Brown were brutally engaging. I also liked the fact that the main character was brutal and morally reprehensible but we usually rooted for her because the villains (usually rapists or robbers) were so much worse than her.
Some of the late 70’s Marvel Previews featured Lilith, the daughter of Dracula and Roger Slifer wrote an editorial saying he got permission to do a regular Haunt of Horror series but it too never appeared.
In late 70s and early 80s started killing off their disposable characters which included some of their horror standbys such as Satana (in Marvel Teamup) and it the Living Colossus (in Hulk). Because of a Jim Shooter edict, all vampires in the marvel universe (including Dracula, Lilith, and Baron Blood) were destroyed by Dr. Strange using the Darkhold. The only survivors, Hannibal King and Morbious the living vampire were cured of their unwanted afflictions. It made for a great storyline but it looked like the end of mainstream Marvel horror.
Steve Gerber churned out some more excellent horror work in the Epic series Void Indigo and Nightmare on Elm Street. Both were victims of censorship. The sword and sorcery book with horror elements. Void indigo was very violent and many refused to stock it so it vanished. Gerber’s Nightmare on Elm Street was a critical and sales success but it was prematurely cancelled before it was even critiqued or boycotted because the country was going towards the right in the early 80’s. Since the governments was going after many kinds of violent media Marvel feared Nightmare on Elm Street would be an easy target.
I may do future blog entries on Marvel horror in the 80s and 90s but then again I may not.
My friend, Valorie Madrid is working on a Haunted House (she also wrote an interesting book called Jesus was a vampire). Go here for more info.
13th Floor is OPEN EVERY NIGHT until October 31st!
Skip-the-line reservations are available, and enjoy discounted prices during the week!
Ranked as one of America’s Best Haunted Houses by Hauntworld.com and HauntedHouses.com!
Tickets on sale now at:
**Asshole of the week:
There was a man on who was interviewed on the radio who was raffling off a fancy gun, rounds of bullets and a picture of Hillary Clinton. He claimed that he was not encouraging people to shoot or kill her. Surrrrrreeeeeeeeee.
