Most of us were not alive when Bill Gaines and Al Feldstein’s EC Comics ceased publication in the mid 1950s with the advent of the Comics Code. Since that time, there have been attempts to revive the series, but many of these attempts have not lasted. Anthologies have come and gone throughout the year to varying degrees of success and notoriety, but none of them had the flair and personality of the original EC Comics run.
Those familiar with the TV show, Tales From The Crypt, may remember the format. Each story was introduced by the Crypt-Keeper, a rotting corpse with deadly puns and a screeching laugh. The original comics had three such hosts – the aforementioned Crypt-Keeper, The Old Witch, and The Vault-Keeper – each of which set the tone for the story to be told. Now, these three hosts guide you through the twists, turns, horrors, and terrors that await in the newly collected EC Archives: The Haunt of Fear – Volume 4. Expected are stories of betrayal, infidelity, murder, monsters, and mayhem. There are retellings of fairy tales that are different than you remember and updated for fans of dime store pulp novels with most of these stories being no longer than ten(ish) pages long.
While not all of the stories were adapted into episodes of Tales from the Crypt, a few from this collection were and had to be expanded to fill enough of an episode’s run time. I was surprised at how well they were adapted from the comics despite each story’s low page count. These stories are the blueprints for other anthology series such as The Twilight Zone and Creepshow, but you can also see the influence on comics such as Neil Gaiman’s Sandman.
The art in this book has been salvaged as best as it possibly can. Carlos Badilla has retained Marie Severin’s colors and made them pop. The reprints look fantastic and give it that shine most 1950s horror doesn’t always get, no matter what format they are remastered in. These aren’t perfect and that’s okay. Some of these shorts can get a little wordy, and you don’t always get the reveal in the proper spot. One element that carried over to the TV show was the very abrupt “win, yet still lose” ending. These mostly come at you like a punchline which makes sense, as a lot of the writers also worked at MAD Magazine.
Haunt of Fear – Volume 4 is a charming collection that, warts and all, is the next best thing to owning the original comics. With an intro written by Robb Zombie, you’ll be dying to get your hands on this collection.
Creative Team: Bill Gaines (writer), Al Feldstein (writer and artist), Otto Binder (writer), Carl Wressler (writer), Grraham Ingels (artist), George Evans (artist), Jack Kamen (artist), Jack Davis (artist), Reed Crandall (artist), Marie Severin (colorist), Carlos Badilla (colorist),
Publisher: Dark Horse
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