Friday, August 1, 2008

The Devil from the Deep

We’re kicking things off in August with an unusual and grisly mermaid tale from the short lived Ziff-Davis Nightmare series. And please, click the GCD issue link below so you can drool over the gorgeously painted cover art by Walter Popp.

From the Fall 1952 issue of Nightmare #2









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Wow! Speaking of mer-people, another THOIA shirt photo was discovered washed ashore today. Pre-code horror fans apparently come in not only all shapes, sizes and sex, but from all depths too!

Say hello to Davey Jones for us, oh kind, creepy mer-person...



And recently I noticed Halloween goodies already on the shelves in various stores around here in STL, seems kind of early but who the heck’s complaining. So to jump the gun like everyone else I’ll be posting classic Halloween mask ads for the first week of August here too, and I’ll even keep them within the theme of that day’s story post, what the heck. I guess three months ain’t that far away, and what’s good for the mer-people is good enough for us surface dwelling air breathers as well.

18 comments:

Unknown said...

I love this! I like to pretend Diana is the Starbucks logo. Good excuse to cue up "Mermaid" by Mark De Gli Antoni and "Melusine" by Shipwreck.

MEAT IS GOOD! VERY GOOD! LET ME HAVE MORE!

silvano said...

Good solid story ; I'll be away for some days so I'll skip posting for some time , bu I'll return ( not a just a promise but a threat )!
PS - perhaps I got carried away with the lyric contest thing , but SAVATAGE's "Sirens" keeps ringing in my ears ...
Thanks for sharing

AndyDecker said...

"Meat is good!"

Lol. And great artwork too.

Anonymous said...

Page 2, panel 6 (center bottom row): "What's eating you?"

Dane said...

A good, engrossing, original story, and you know I love that midcentury bachelor pad of Bob's.

Frederick said...

"Ask any mermaid you happen to see,
'what's the best tuna?' Chicken of the Sea!"

Sorry, Charlie.

Dave Tackett said...

The whole "Meat is Good!" quote with the picture seems destined for snarky t-shirts.

Anonymous said...

Now that was a great story. And I loved the clean, spare lines of the artwork.

Bob's blue eyeshadow at the bottom of p2 and the "Dear John" note suggest another motive for John's anger...

Mr. Karswell said...

>Bob's blue eyeshadow at the bottom of p2 and the "Dear John" note suggest another motive for John's anger...

The first time I read this story I thought the gay ovetones were pretty obvious... I didn't want to blow that angle in my intro so I'm glad someone else picked up on it too.

I also hope everyone enjoys my hotter new scanlans too, I bumped the resolution up another 25% for a more gorgeous, in your face experience.

Kitty LeClaw said...

Wow. Hawt. I need a man-servant.

Thanks for introducing me to this meat-hungry beauty, Spookeriffic Psychoholic Karswell!

Anonymous said...

I KNEW I WAS IN FOR SOMETHING GREAT THIS MORNING WHEN THERE WAS ALREADY THIS MANY COMMENTS ON TODAYS POST. EXCELLENT TALE AND I THOUGHT THE SAME THING ABOUT THE SUBTEXT, PRETTY RISKY FOR A 50'S COMIC BOOK.

LOVE THE MERMAN PIC TOO!

Tenebrous Kate said...

LOVE the "Dear John" letter! It's a subtext within a subtext within a meattastic subtext--I'm exhausted just thinking about the weighty potential of it all.

Anonymous said...

I want Bob's living room - pool and all! And I love when he's angry you "pigeon-hearted philistine"!

Patrick said...

Great story and a big lesson to be learned here too. Don't fall in love with anything you catch while fishing!
I love how the hook in the arm was enough to make her pass out- or maybe it was exhaustion from towing the boat around while on the hook? Truth be told, I think she was more of a piranha than a mermaid- so some thrash metal lyrics from Exodus work for this one: "Piranha" from the thrash masterpiece "Bonded By Blood"

"gates of hell are old and cracked
they tumble and they fall
out rush a bloody wall of death
to kill anything at all
their sole mission is to kill
strip your bones and flesh
rip out your eyes tear off your face
an agonizing death"

Anonymous said...

fantastic post

the boat towing panels on page two are right out of jaws

Frederick said...

All I can think about is squeezing the huge, pus-infected boil on John's shoulder on the right side of Page 6. That sucker has GOT to GO!

Anybody else notice?

SPLORCH!

Unknown said...

Read this last year and never got any subtext. Of course, I doubt most who bought it in 1952 were on the lookout for such subtext.

Anonymous said...

This is a total gender bender with the subtext of the story and the guy in a mermaid suit! Thats one nice tail he's got though! LOL