443 – Weird Fantasy Too

Just a couple months after debuting its new lineup of anthology comic books, EC introduces Weird Fantasy #1 (March 1950) to keep Weird Science in weird company. I loved the stories in this book! One involved keeping a human brain alive, another involved time travel, and yet another featured inter-planetary space travel with a twist […]

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439 – Weird Science

Rounding out EC’s new line of horror comics is Weird Science, an anthological science fiction comic taking over the numbering from “Saddle Romances”. The stories are very reminiscent of The Twilight Zone TV series (1959), including an alien that has a third eye :-).

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438 – Vault of Gruesome

In January 1950, EC renamed its “War Against Crime” comic to “Vault of Horror” with issue #12. In it, we get even more gruesome tales of horror than in last month’s Crypt of Terror comic, including an evil character using acid to first disfigure someone and then attempt to dissolve their entire body! The Vault […]

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436 – Crypt Creeper

Well, the era of EC horror comics finally begins in December 1949 with The Crypt of Terror #17. Prior to this issue, the comic was named “Crime Patrol” and before that it was International Comics. Remember? The Crypt-Keeper introduces the first story, but his debut appearance was actually two issues prior in Crime Patrol #15, […]

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434 – Evil and Weird

The very very last vestige of Timely (Marvel) Comics’ superheroes occurs with Captain America’s Weird Tales #75 (November 1949). The cover mentions Captain America, but the book is very clearly EC Comics-inspired (down to the left-hand vertical title bar) with anthological horror tales. The magazine probably needed to include “Captain America” in the title so […]

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384 – Moon Girl and the Prince

The lineup for EC Comics begins to shift at the end of 1947 after Max Gaines’ untimely boating death, when William Gaines takes over the reins. In December 1947, Moon Girl and the Prince debuts. Moon Girl is a girl from Samarkand who has super strength and a moon rock which gives her even more […]

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348 – Manhattan’s Files from the Crypt

EC Comics began to expand its lineup beyond educational comics in the late 1940s. In early 1947, EC launched the first set of “Entertaining Comics” including International Comics #1 (February 1947). International featured a series of adventure-type stories, including Van Manhattan, “America’s newest supersleuth”. Van Manhattan was joined by Igor the Archer, Juan Meatball, and […]

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346 – Eerie!

In January 1947, Avon Periodicals published Eerie Comics #1, a one-shot horror comic. The comic features anthological horror stories and (as Wikipedia says) is “credited with establishing the horror comics genre” that EC Comics came to dominate. I have to also give credit to “Just a Story” (DC) and “The Spirit” (Quality) as contributing to […]

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319 – EC Begins

In 1944, Max Gaines had sold the rights to the All-American characters (Green Lantern, The Atom, Doctor Mid-Nite) and titles to DC, keeping the rights to “Picture Stories from the Bible”. By June 1946, Gaines had started publishing comics as EC, Educational Comics. Within a year or so, EC would switch to “Entertaining Comics” and […]

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