Artful Alienation at 1950s Atlas: Bill Everett’s Forgotten Gems

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Among the true lost gems of comics are the forgotten horror stories Bill Everett drew (and in some cases wrote) for Atlas/Time/Marvel in the 1950s. We are pleased to present three of these long unseen minor masterpieces in this first of several posts we’ll make in appreciation and analysis of Bill Everett’s work of this period. In this post, we examine the connecting theme of alienation that runs through a great deal of Everett’s best work.

OVERVIEW

To set the stage and help show that what Everett accomplished in his own quiet way was truly extraordinary, a brief overview is in order. Most would agree that Atlas/Timely/Marvel comics of the 1950s were far from innovative. Their output was the sheer opposite of publishers such as E.C., Hillman, and a few others. If a trend seemed popular, ATM (as we’ll call them, for brevity’s sake) hopped on the bandwagon with a desperate energy.



A survey of ATM’s 1950s comics reveals one copy-cat effort after another—in genres from war to horror to romance to funny-animal. This cynical trend-surfing served ATM well—even during the comics recession of the later ‘50s, when the company threatened to expire.

ATM had no house style. Although editor Stan Lee was quite fond of the impressionist pen-scribbles of Joe Maneely—and encouraged other ATM artists to attempt the artist’s style—he allowed his stable of cartoonists to pursue their own look and feel.

Below: An example of the Atlas "Maneely style," as rendered by veteran artist Carl Burgos (thanks to Doc V. for the ID)

The freedom allowed artists at ATM in the '50s was comparable to E.C.’s pursuance of highly recognizable artist styles. However, where E.C. had a limited number of titles, and strove to fulfill a vision of the highest possible quality,  ATM had an ever-shifting army of exploitative books to be filled. Thus, their artists could pretty much do as they pleased, because there was likely little time to art direct. In fact, most of the E.C. artists wound up working at ATM in the latter 1950s, after E.C. collapsed. It’s a sure bet that ATM artists worked with open copies of E.C. comics at their elbows (as is likely today in many cases).

This laissez-faire attitude attracted notable stylists to ATM throughout the 1950s. Gene Colan was able to develop an eccentric, chiaroscuro style through sheer trial and error, spread over dozens of stories. Bernard Krigstein was probably less constrained at Atlas under Stan Lee’s loose editorship than he was at E.C., and turned in numerous impressive stylistic experiments (which we plan to look at at in a future post). Bizarro cartoonists such as Matt Fox and Robert Q. Sale were similarly free from constraint.

Below: Matt Fox Splash Panel
Weird Worlds 27 (March,1953)

Below: Robert Q. Sale Splash Page
Menace 10 (March, 1954)

ENTER BILL EVERETT


The few genuinely great artists in the ATM stable had the opportunity to hone their accomplished styles—and to experiment with visual storytelling. Among the best of these artists was Bill Everett. Just take a look at this masterful tier from “Ghost Story,” which first appeared in Amazing Detective Cases #13 (July, 1952). This cinematic sequence shows Everett’s sophisticated graphic draftsmanship and his uncanny ability – similar to a film director -- to select the perfect image:



Everett was a major player in the Timely-Atlas story. He was in on the ground floor of the imprint’s history. His character of Prince Namor, the Sub-Mariner, gave comic books one of its first and most influential outsider characters. Namor was immediately popular. Via a series of epic book-length battles with Timely’s other early superstar, the Human Torch, Sub-Mariner soon garnered his own title, and also appeared in various Timely anthologies.

Below: Comics' First Great Anti-Hero – The Sub-Mariner
Marvel Comics #1 (1939)

Everett, like his most lauded creation, was something of an outsider as well—even though he had a considerable hand in shaping the destiny of the American comic book. His feverish, fairy-tale flavored storytelling, coupled with an art style that effortlessly slid from caricature and comedy to sleek, stylized realism, was neither fish nor fowl. As the super-hero genre conformed to an increasingly prosaic look and feel, in the 1940s, Everett’s work refused to march in step. If anything, it became more florid in its dance between cartoon and representational drawing.

ATM became Everett’s home base. Though he would work for other companies, he kept coming back. There, he could draw—and write—in his own chosen manner, with little or no editorial harness.
Everett clearly relished this freedom. Even when illustrating dirt-dumb scripts of Lee and other ATM writers, Everett put his passion and personality on every page, in every panel.

Everett's investiture in his 1950s work is striking. Textures, atmospheres, senses and moods vibrate from his brushline. This line could be gossamer as a spider’s web, or bold as a woodcut. Relatively realistic figures shared panel space with goggle-eyed, distorted caricatures. Visual detail could become baroque—or be pared to its essentials.

When Everett was able to write his own material, the stories themselves become as forceful and impressive as the artwork.

The theme of the alienated outsider that started with the Sub-Mariner in 1939 appears constantly in Everett’s ‘50s ATM work. Like Jack Cole, Everett was sometimes in the thrall of a few pet themes. These give his stories a compelling impact that, like Cole’s work for Quality Comics in the 1940s, stands out like a beacon in the comics where they appeared.


THE MEN FROM MARS (1954)

In “The Men From Mars” from Adventures Into Weird Worlds #25 (January, 1954), the theme of alienation couldn’t be stronger. This mini-masterpiece pre-sages Jack Finney’s seminal 1955 novel, Invasion of the Body Snatchers (which was serialized in the Saturday Evening Post after Everett's story appeared in 1954).

The story – more than likely written by Bill Everett himself – also is simpatico with the early works of Philip K. Dick, such as Time Out of Joint (1959). These landmark novels filtered the post-war angst and consumerism of the 1950’s through the burgeoning genre of science fiction. Everett’s story here, does the same.

While the story is unsigned, it's clearly all from Everett’s hand—including the splash panel. Atlas sometimes had other artists touch up—or draw new material—for the all-important splashes. Although the opening blurb (and the story’s title) aren’t by Everett, the splash otherwise vibrates with the nervous, dense texture of his pen and brush. The monster-masked female face, at the bottom of the panel, contains some trademark sensuous Everett brush-lines. The fine pen lines of the frightened male character’s hair (and the stripes on his shirt) are also typical of his finely detailed ‘50s work.

 


Henry Parker, the story’s protagonist, awakes one morning to find the world he knows—or thought he knew—torn asunder. His wife, neighbors and family physician aren’t human anymore.  Everywhere he looks, what he once considered humanity has become repulsive. Yet, this has suddenly become the status quo. Henry is truly alone in the world.

Even trusted figures—Henry’s doctor, and a troop of soldiers that appear on the last few pages—are rendered truly monstrous. Note the military figures on p.5. Everett stresses the faceless institution of the armed services. In an era of gung-ho war comics that celebrated the fightin’ men of Korea and World War II as strong individuals, these non-human soldiers are truly chilling. Everett conveys, via his graphics, a powerful sense that the institutions of society have been vanquished by monsters who don’t share his protagonist’s values—and his humanity.

The matter-of-fact attitude of the Martians (who, as in Finney’s novel, have appropriated the bodies and identities of human beings) contrasts with Henry’s ever-heightened freak-out. The horrifying revelation that Henry is really a Martian—but has forgotten, through his own complacency—occurs simultaneously with his shocking suicide at story’s end.

Produced in the last days of comics, prior to the installation of the Comics Code, “The Men From Mars” is passionate, intense and outrageous—in a way comics would soon cease to be. The very complacency that Everett’s story warns against became the status quo which strangled mainstream comics’ growth for the next decade.

THE TOTEM (1956)


In “The Totem,” first published in Strange Stories of Suspense #6 (December, 1956), Everett turns in a tour de force folk-horror story of cultural alienation. Unlike the high-focus imagery of “The Men From Mars,” the drawings in this story are lush, with soft brushstrokes depicting the textures of water, ice, the landscape and fur coats the characters wear. Everett's best work has a great deal more presence than the typical comic book story of this era… and that may well be because of the textural quality of Everett’s art.
This story – lettered by Everett -- also employs a distinctive brushed panel border technique. In an era of ruled panel borders and Leroy lettering sets, Everett fearlessly freehanded his borders and lettering with a loose, living line. The brushed panel border – used in every single panel in this story – often appears in Everett’s work. The story begins with a (literal) splash page that shows off Everett’s skill at drawing water.

 


“The Totem” has the structure and feel of a fairy-tale, albeit with darker, heavier themes. It can be seen as a parable on colonialism, racism, and the sense of entitlement by the Caucasian antagonist. Everett also works in some of the fanciful mythology seen in his Sub-Mariner universe—the sense of a highly special culture that is hidden from the eyes of the “normal” world.

Al Clark, in his lust for the gold totem pole, and his lack of regard for the life, culture and well being of the native Alaskan, is caught in a nightmarish loop of ruthless self-aggrandizement. Each time he returns, he re-destroys the lone Alaskan’s igloo, steals the pole—and then finds himself (and his crew) smaller in stature, and back at square one.

Eventually, Al Clark shrinks to the same size as the sentient totem-pole people. In the story’s poetic-justice finale, Clark has become part of the object he once tried to possess.

This is more than a simple twist-of-fate E. C. type story. It’s not about revenge, as most comic book horror stories of the genre and era. “The Totem” takes into consideration the impact of different cultures on the “official” world of Caucasians. Clark, who sought to rob the native Alaskan of his cultural icon, becomes instead assimilated into the icon itself.

“The Totem” impresses on several levels—with its unusually thoughtful themes, with its confident, adroit visual staging, and with its inexorable narrative path. There is much more at play here than you might expect from a post-Comics Code story—or from a later ‘50s Atlas comic, period.

There isn’t another comics story quite like “The Totem.” Whether Everett was conscious of its heady themes or not, they give this story a haunting, convincing quality. The Comics Code did not blunt Everett’s gifts as a storyteller, commentator or graphic artist.

THE CARTOONIST’S CALAMITY (1951)

Our final story today comes from a curious comic book that spanned the transition from 1940s Timely Comics to 1950s Atlas. Venus reflects the identity-crisis of the post-war American comic book. Is it a super-hero title? Romance comic? Horror and science-fiction? Or is it a light-hearted, humorous approach to mythology? Venus is all these things. In its 19-issue run, it bounced off the walls of many comic book genres. I’m surprised it didn’t become a Western comic for a few issues.

Bill Everett inherited the Venus title towards the end of the series’ run. He was clearly inspired by its admixture of pin-up art and anything-can-happen narratives. His fairy-tale sensibility resounds through these comics, which we can safely assume he wrote and drew.

One of three stories by Bill Everett in Venus #17 (December, 1951), “The Cartoonist’s Calamity” stands out as both an astonishing exercise in style and also Everett’s own statement about alienation as it applied to the life of a comic book artist in the 1950s.

This playful story – written by Everett – also has a hallucinogenic aspect, with Everett using every stylistic trick in the book, and then some. Whew! This is truly a dazzling visual smorgasbord! Bill Everett’s highest level of investiture in this five-page filler story suggest that the story resonated deeply with him and was an inspiration and an invitation to let his own Id run free.

Jimmy Rogers, the harried protagonist of this story, is one stressed-out soul, at once alienated and alienating to others. The pressures of his job as cartoon editor of Beauty magazine (the home base of the Venus universe) have turned him into a hostile, sunken-eyed abuser. The beautiful, compassionate, goddess-come-to-earth Venus sees through his frazzled facade, and helps him overcome his inner demons.

 


Rogers moonlights as a horror comics cartoonist, and the line between reality and his overheated imagination has been shattered. Imps of the perverse crowd around his drawing board and taunt him. They’re unlike the ghouls and brutes of typical horror comics. These leering, taunting Id-monsters interrupt Rogers' sleep, and cause his confidence and good nature to dissolve. He stands between the world of “reality” and the world of comic book horror the way Everett’s half-breed Sub-Mariner stands between two worlds. So, even in a fun trifle, Everett’s obsession with alienation drives his work to rarely achieved heights and depths.

It’s fascinating to see a cartoonist depict his own world within the confines of a comic book story. Jack Cole famously caricatured himself into his 1940s stories a few times (sometimes as a hare-lipped, stuttering oaf), but his creations never threatened his well-being.

It’s tempting to see Rogers as a stand-in for Everett. Whether that’s true or not is lost to time. “Cartoonist’s Calamity” has a pell-mell energy, full of lurid humor and grotesquerie. The first panel of p.3 depicts the rift between the real world and the realm of imagination and creation.

It takes an outsider to the world of cartooning—Venus herself—to provide the solution to Rogers’ ink-stained dilemma. She roughs in the figure of “The Hero,” and encourages Rogers to ink her sketch. “The Hero” bears a strong resemblance to Everett’s Sub-Mariner. He cheerfully dispatches the goblins, de-calamitizes Rogers’ life, and dutifully returns to the inkwell.

Rogers’ melodramatic statement that he’ll never draw horror comics again is met with Venus’ pragmatism. “Let’s get back to work,” she suggests with a smile. Rogers is no longer the prisoner of his imagination, and Venus has proved a heroic outsider. As “The Hero” cries out, on his exit, “Your ladyfriend is positively ingenious!”

 

 April, 1970: Bill Everett at a Comic Book Convention three years before his death

Bill Everett’s theme of alienation runs through a great deal of his work, from the angry, anti-hero figure of Prince Namor (The Sub-Mariner) to his many excellent short stories in the 1950s.  Surely, Everett’s fixation on this theme suggests that he saw himself as a kind of outsider, as well. 

As we hope we’ve shown you here, Bill Everett’s work certainly deserves more study and appreciation than it’s been accorded. Blake Bell’s recent biography of Bill Everett, Fire and Water, is a great place to start. In Bell’s book, we learn that Everett struggled with alcoholism and had many self-defeating patterns in his life.  Just considering his career in comic books alone, it is easy to see why Everett felt alienated. Here was a major pioneer in the form, a guy whose creative genius was a pillar of the company that became very successful, and he was treated as just another contract laborer for 30 years.

However, towards the end of his life, Everett rose above his own problems, and became a very giving and compassionate person that felt connected to the world. He was a very strong participant in Alcoholics Anonymous, sponsoring and supporting the recovery of many others.  As Bell recounts, at his funeral  in 1973, the many people from the comic book industry that attended were astonished to discover they were hugely outnumbered by people from the AA community. Everett may have felt a profound sense of alienation in his life and career, but thankfully, at the end of his days, he found his place in the world.

Now, what the world needs are some good-quality, annotated Everett anthologies. There exist literally dozens of such stories in Everett’s little-explored 1950’s comic book work. We will, as time permits, look at more of these. But, for now, we hope you had fun rooting around in the old Comic Book Attic (sound of echoing, ominous laughter and the smell of decaying paper….)

Note: Be sure to check out Doc V.'s amazing article on Bill Everett's ATM romance comic book stories at his blog, Timely-Atlas-Comics: http://timely-atlas-comics.blogspot.com/2011/03/bill-everett-timely-romance-stories.html

All text copyright 2011 Frank M. Young and Paul C. Tumey; thanks to Doc V. for his feedback and clarification

The Insanity of Censorship – Ruth Roche and The Comics Code in the 1950s

Stories this post:
"Out of the Grave"- Haunted Thrills 11 (Ajax-Farrell, Sept. 1953) - Written by Ruth Roche, artist unknown

"Fair Exchange" - Strange 5 (Ajax-Farrell, Jan. 1958) - Rewriter and artist unknown

Much has been written--and debated--about the censorship and witch hunts that plagued the comic-book industry in the 1950s.

Here, we present to you a fascinating example of the same comic book story in two forms: pre-code, and then edited for a reprinting five years later in post-comics code America. In addition, both versions are quite unusual. The pre-code story is a bizarre, dreamlike concoction of horror at the inhumanity and cruelty of the Holocaust -- a rare, unflinching stare at the "true" horror of the concentration camps in comic books of the period (the famous EC story, "Master Race," by Al Feldstein and Bernie Krigstein is another, much more well-known and considerably more artful and accomplished example). The post-code version is also unique for its sheer nuttiness and dreamlike logic breaks.

As with video games today, '50s comics were criticized for their violence, and for their supposed bad influence on American youth. Comic books were publicly burned; newspapers and magazines ran think-pieces that excoriated the "funny books" while offering well-intended if wrong-minded social commentary.

With the enactment of the Comics Code, in 1955, a set of harsh strictures--much harsher than those famously placed on Hollywood in 1934--forced comic book publishers to toe the line, or go under. Distributors and news dealers, leery of public outcry, refused to sell or distribute non-Code approved comics.

This history has been the subject of numerous essays and books. What is often overlooked, in historical studies, is the actual impact the Code had on comic book stories.

Paul recently chanced upon a story--rather, a pair of stories--that exemplify the before and after impact of the Code's rules. It's a gruesome horror story from the infamous Ajax-Farrell imprint and its post-Code, much-altered reprint version. You can see the Comics Code Authority "seal" on the cover of the 1958 comic.

"Out of the Grave," first published in Haunted Thrills #11, cover-dated September, 1953, is the work of the Iger Studios. Greg Sadowski offers some compelling information on publisher Jerry Iger (left) and his partner Ruth Roche in his excellent book Four-Color Fear. Roche is listed as the editor of this comic book; I'll assume that she authored "Out of the Grave."

As with Roche's other stories, this is a blend of the loony and the compelling. Its theme is brutal, even for a 1953 horror comic. The aptly-named Col. Eric Von Grimm delights in torturing, killing and hounding "the poor unfortunates who were not of the master race." The Colonel, stationed in occupied Italy, sees to the slaughter of the "filthy partisans" who defy Nazi rule. He apparently lives in a cozy home with his wife, Helga, in occupied Italy.

The story's intro informs us they are "a loving couple," but the Colonel's is a life of inequity. He spends each day killing upstart Italians, supervising the torments of concentration camp prisoners, and intimidating cow-towing local merchants. Yet he can't afford a new pair of boots. His current pair are worn out; they hurt his feet.

Meanwhile, status-conscious Helga demands the nice things in life, including a lampshade made of human skin. As Helga crows, "they're all the rage now." Her social nemesis, "that horrible Gretchen Smutcher," has a better human-skin lampshade than hers. "Women," reflects von Grimm as he removes his battered boots. "I'll never understand them."

Using his grotesque jobsite percs, von Grimm acquires some "leather" for a new pair of boots, and coerces a local cobbler to make his new footgear.

From here, "Out of the Grave" wends an increasingly nutty path to an attempted school-of-E.C. Comics shock ending. It is a typical genre piece from the peak year of horror comics. Yet, embedded in its talk of human skin and women named Smutcher is a surprising touch of humanity. Some attempt is made to show the effects of von Grimm's cruel actions on those around him. We also witness enough of his interactions with his wife to know theirs is a horribly messed-up union.

Had this story been conceived by Al Feldstein and William Gaines, over at E.C. Comics' offices, it might have been rendered even more poignant, despite the literal mechanics of its contrived surprise ending. "Out of the Grave" is more disturbing for what it tries to be than for what it is not. It's exploitation horror with an attempted heart. Ambitious and inept in concept and execution, it is nonetheless memorable.

Cut to 1958. The Comics Code has been in power for three years. The comics biz has been neutered. Gone are ghouls, gangsters, gun molls. Carnage, murder and mayhem are suggested, if at all invoked. Careers have been destroyed in the process. Surviving publishers have conformed to the Comics Code and had each story ruthlessly scrutinized.

Interior, Ajax-Farrell editorial offices: the decision is made to reprint stories from five years prior. Among those chosen: "Out of the Grave."

With its constant sadism, slaughter, inhumanity and general affront to civil behavior, a less Code-worthy comic book story could not be found. Thus, massive alterations and re-writes befell "Out of the Grave," re-titled "Fair Exchange" for its publication in issue #5 of Strange, cover-dated January 1958.

"Fair Exchange" is a different story. It is fascinating to study each of the story's six pages, in both incarnations, as an example of pre-and post-Code comic books.

Page 1: the splash panel's text introduction is completely re-written--and is more concise than that of "Out of the Grave." It's generally well-written, save for one sentence fragment. On the right side of the splash page, note the replacement of tortured prisoners with a hastily daubed-in bush, colored pink. It appears that Antonio, the cobbler, has awakened from a massive cotton-candy spill.

Col. von Grimm retains his name, but his methods and manners have changed dramatically. Instead of an eagerness to kill the partisan rebels, von Grimm expresses passive frustration: the naughty Italians won't behave. It's really quite vexing!

The soldiers in panel 2 no longer fire their weapons. Though the Colonel still wields his rifle in panel 3, the dugout and its sitting-duck partisans are no longer there. The rifle in von Grimm's arm is now the tool of an empty gesture.

On page 2 (below): For starters, Helga's face has been extensively smoothed out, de-wrinkled and glamorized. This is in accord with one of the less-remembered edicts of the Comics Code. Faces that could be considered frightening or disturbing had to be toned down.

The von Grimm couple's dialogue, on this page, speaks volumes about the changes in the American comic book--and about the conformist attitudes of mainstream 1950s America. Note that the lampshade is now just... a lampshade--and not a fancy one at that. As new Helga complains, "I'm sick and tired of this neighborhood... the shops are bombed or out of stocks! ...I hate our furniture, and it's time you did something about it!"

More tellingly, Helga has an issue with Nazi pride. “Why must everything be stamped with the swastika? ... Lately, I wish I had other labels!” Her husband patiently explains that “it really is patriotic to stamp our personal articles.” Ironically, Code censors nixed the inclusion of the swastika on the lamp shade—wrecking the re-writer’s attempts to keep it there.

In the final two panels, Col. von Grimm muses about his wife’s desire for “imported goods,” rather than human-skin accessories. The final panel of p.2 is the first unaltered frame in this revised version. Apparently, the Code approved a man bemoaning the shoddy state of his footwear.

So, did the Nazis actually make lampshades from human skin? Where does this come from? Here's what The Straight Dope website has to say:

Shortly after U.S. troops liberated the Buchenwald Nazi concentration camp in 1945, director Billy Wilder made a documentary about the camp to publicize Nazi atrocities. A widely circulated still photo from the film showed a table covered with preserved human remains, including two shrunken heads; several pieces of what appears to be tattooed skin; and an ordinary-looking table lamp. The film's narration says that among the items found was "a lampshade, made of human skin, made at the request of an SS officer's wife."

It seems likely that Ruth Roche, or whoever wrote this story, had seen -- or at least knew about the Wilder film and the circulating photo and story. Here's the (in)famous photo of the horrific Nazi human souvenirs:

Page 3: The first panel is also unaltered from its 1953 incarnation. Panel 2 changes the emphasis from dead bodies to surplus boots. In both cases, the prisoners are “stupid peasants.” In ’53, they’re idiots because they refuse to die; ‘58’s citation of inanity is their lack of spare shoes.

Panel 3 is altered dramatically. Instead of von Grimm killing a prisoner, for the use of his skin, he spots a “stupid peasant” who happens to wear fine boots. Invoking the classic “seize them” line (a necessity of B-movies and other popcult detritus), von Grimm spares a life and confiscates footwear.

Angelo, the cobbler, is given a beauty makeover similar to Helga’s. Good guys have no facial blemishes in post-Code comics. von Grimm retains his shadowy furrows, as he’s the bad guy.

In the final panel, the “er, leather” is now just boots. They look suspiciously unlike boots in the soldier’s bundle, which was unaltered from the ’53 original.

Page 4 takes on a fairy-tale aspect in the ’58 rewrite. Angelo recognizes his own handiwork, instead of seeing tell-tale tattoos on the skin of his son. Now, his emotional connection is even further removed. It’s no longer his son, but his nephew.

As well, the rewrite’s admirably absurd new shock ending comes into play. Angelo raises his hammer in the air, still aquiver, as in ‘53’s version, but his thoughts are no longer of “a pair of boots that can strike and kill.” Now, the boots “can tick off the end of a career!”

In the final panel, Angelo’s vengeful thoughts are blotted out, as are the lines of care on his face. A hasty attempt at feathering sits above the poor cobbler’s head.

On page 5, feces meet fan blades. Angelo is no longer rewarded with death, as in the 1953 original, but with imprisonment and deportation. In the final two panels, Angelo no longer sweats or spits. Once again, his face is shorn of blemishes as he meets a much softer fate.

Page 6 sums up much of what was wrong with the Comics Code, and how it negatively impacted comic book storytelling. There is crude poetic justice in the ’53 original, with the explosives set in the Nazi emblems, which the Colonel will inevitably click together in salute to a superior. As with the other more complex ideas attempted in “Out of the Grave,” this is telegraphed, and loses much of its effectiveness.

The first three panels of this final page are unaltered—even Helga’s wrinkles remain in her panel 1 close-up.

Panel 5 is the one entirely new frame of this re-make. The artist apparently didn’t have access to earlier pages. Helga now looks like a prom queen, instead of the middle-aged harridan she has been.

What happens in the climax to “Fair Exchange” is laughable—and must have seemed so 54 years ago. One has to wonder if Michael Kuppermann travelled back in time to create the story’s conclusion. A ticking clock can be annoying, but it is just cause to end a military career?

This absurd twist is made sorta-poetic in the story’s closing panel, in which the same un-named “friend” kneels before Antonio’s grave and muses sagely to himself. His run-on sentence is worth savoring:

Who would think of the clever trick of putting a set clock in the heels of a Nazi colonel at a time it would ruin him!

“Out of the Grave” is no masterpiece; neither is it hackwork. The writer (Roche?) grappled with larger-than-usual themes for a 1953 horror comic. He or she didn’t have the space—or the chops—to do much with these controversial themes, but it appeared they tried.

It is inexplicable why this story was chosen for a Code-approved revision. Everything about it, in its 1953 version, is an affront to the tenets of the Code. Certainly the Iger concern had milder stories sitting in its inventory!

Ajax-Farrell was in its last days, and, like the endtimes of the Nazi regime, thrift and re-use were of necessity. It took, perhaps, a couple of hours to re-write the story and re-tool the changes needed to the artwork. No one knew the difference, and no one cared. It was just another story, to fill the pages of just another comic book, from a publisher that would soon be history.

Fifty-four years later, the comparison of original and bowdlerized remake is fascinating as a study in censorship from a social regime that was almost as oppressive as Col. von Grimm himself.

P.S.: Many Ajax-Farrell stories were reprinted—and gruesomely retooled—for Myron Fass’ super-crappy Eerie Publications. We didn’t have the energy or time to prowl through available scans of Eerie mags for a possible third version of this story. We can only hope that it was chosen for re-reprinting, due to its gruesome themes, and that Fass tarted the story up even further in his revision. If anyone is aware of a Fass-published third version of this story, please let us know, and we’ll add it to this post.

This is the first of a new series of posts on Comic Book Attic, which will now serve as a blog for Paul Tumey and Frank Young to explore facets of the American comic-book. You may be familiar with our blogs, Cole’s Comics and Stanley Stories. They’re focused on one creator and his work. Comic Book Attic affords us a chance to write about—and share—other comics material, both great and effed-up, from the tattered history of the four-color medium.

We look forward to the fun we’ll have here, and we hope you’ll enjoy our musings as well.