Countdown to Halloween 2023 MONSTER TIMES Unpublished TALES FROM THE CRYPT Cover Art

Here's a Halloween treat...no trick for you guys!

Control-Click on the art to enlarge!

The centerfold from Monster Times #10, featuring the original, unpublished version of the cover for EC's Tales from the Crypt #38 (1953) by Jack Davis!

The published version was censored by EC itself because of the ongoing Seduction of the Innocent "comics cause juvenile delinquency" mania sweeping the US at the time...

...and, while this one is fairly scary, the original was waaaaaay gorier!

Here's the original art for the uncensored, unpublished version...

Note the rubber cement stains on the lower right-hand side of the art!
That's because this "patch" was pasted over that area...

...resulting in this toned-down version...

...which was then photographed at the printer and colored!

When the Monster Times presented this never-seen version, they also arranged to help release it (along with another censored EC cover)...

...as posters!

For the record, this is the published version of the Vault of Horror cover shown above...

Trivia: the reprints of these issues of Tales and Vault both use the uncensored versions of these covers!

Bonus: Here's the advertised Tales from the Crypt poster in all its gory glory!

(Compare it with the published cover at the top of this post!)

This concludes our Countdown to Halloween 2023 presentation!

We hope you've enjoyed reading it as much as we did sharing it with you!

And don't forget to check out the other participants in the

Countdown to Halloween 2023 Blogathon!

They're all Kool Ghouls!

Countdown to Halloween 2023 MONSTER TIMES "'Tales from the Crypt' Movie Review"

Before the recent trio of Tales from the Crypt movies (not based on the comics stories)...

...there was a feature-length "portmanteau" film which adapted five EC Comics tales, two from Tales from the Crypt, one from Vault of Horror, and two from Haunt of Fear!

(Control-click on the following pages to enlarge!)

Horror anthology movies were extremely popular in the early to mid-1970s.

Amicus Studios, which did Tales also did Vault of Horror, adapting several more EC stories!

On an EC Comics-related note, comic book/sci-fi/fantasy cons are commonplace now, occurring somewhere in the US every weekend.
But back in the early 1970s, they were pretty rare.

Even big cities had only two or three per year!
So when one dedicated specifically to EC Comics was scheduled in 1972...it was AN EVENT!

There has, literally, never been another comic convention like it to this day!

BE HERE ON HALLOWEEN...when we conclude our presentation with the first appearance (from 1972) of an EC Comic cover which was censored before publication!

Please Support Horror Comics of the 1950s

Visit Amazon and Buy

Tales from the Crypt / Vault of Horror

Double-Feature

Countdown to Halloween 2023 MONSTER TIMES "Interview with Bill Gaines and Al Feldstein"

Go deep into the psycho psyches of EC's horror comics publisher and editor!

Hope you don't end up as juvenile delinquents after you finish reading this!

(Control-click on these pages to enlarge)

Please don't prove Fredrik Wertham right!

Don't go and commit crimes after reading this!!!

Comics don't cause juvenile deliquency...probably!!!

Next Week:

The first Tales from the Crypt movie!

The EC Family Tree!

Plus Other Goodies!

Please Support Horror Comics of the 1950s

Visit Amazon and Order...

EC Horror Library of the 1950s

(It ain't cheap,...but it's GREAT!)

Paid Link

Countdown to Halloween 2023 MONSTER TIMES "Here Come da SHRINK!!!" & "Introducin' the Gruesome Threesome"

Who was the fiend in human form who almost destroyed comics in the 1950s?

(Control-click on the art to enlarge)

Read on and find out in this article from Don Thompson, co-editor of the Comics Buyers Guide trade newspaper and the reference books All in Color for a Dime and The Comic Book Book!

Now that you've absorbed all that knowledge, let's talk trash...with the three hosts of EC's horror books, moderated by noted comics historian, movie/tv/comics scriptwriter, and (at the time) assistant to Jack (King) Kirby, Mark Evanier!

Next Week, an interview with EC's Publisher, Bill Gaines, and Editor, Al Feldstein!

Please Support Horror Comics of the 1950s

Visit Amazon and Order...

Ten-Cent Plague

Great Comic Book Scare and How It Changed America

Countdown to Halloween 2023 MONSTER TIMES "Horror Comics of the 1950s"

Our premiere post is an overview (with a familiar title) about the rise and fall of EC's horror comics line!

(Note: click on the pages to enlarge them!)

(The final page of the article is a two-column half-page.

Again, click on the art to enlarge)

Remember, in the 1970s, there was no internet, so no way to learn about the history of comics from the Golden Age to the 1970s except though reference books.
And while there were a few non-fiction books about comics out there like All in Color for a Dime and The Great Comic Book Heroes, there were none about horror comics (unlike the kool book from the 1990s advertised below)!
Note; There was an oversized (and expensive) 1971 comic reprint hardcover officially-called EC Horror Library of the 1950s, but better known for the title on the cover...

...which had a much too-brief historical text feature before the wonderfully-gory reprints!
So for Baby Boomers born after EC ended their color comics in the mid-1950s, this bi-weekly newspaper was their introduction to the joys of EC!
BTW, Monster Times sold it through their mail-order department.
Note the price, at a time when comics were 15¢ and the average paperback was 95¢!

(And, yes, click on the art to enlarge it!)

Next Week: A demonic double-feature of "Here Come Da Shrink: Spawn of Dr Wertham", about the MD who wrote Seduction of the Innocent, and "Introducin' the Gruesome Threesome" about the Crypt-Keeper, Old Witch, and Vault-Keeper by comic writer and historian Mark Evanier.

Please Support Horror Comics of the 1950s

Visit Amazon and Buy...

Taylor History of Comics Vol 1

Horror Comics

Countdown to Halloween 2023 MONSTER TIMES "EC Comics"

In the early 1970s, there was a kool bi-weekly newspaper devoted to horror/sci-fi...

...and, for October, we've unearthed a slew of the paper's never-reprinted features from #10, an issue from half a century ago, dedicated to EC Comics!

Be here every Tuesday (including Halloween itself) for a terrifying tidbit!

You've been warned!