VOLUME lN04

JEFF JONES IN COLOR P.16

WORLD'S FIRST NEWSPAPER OF

ON SALE EVERY 2 'WEEKS

ter Times The Mons

~ }: ~ \\ .. .. ~ \ 'f. ,

1

•

page 2

The World's First

of Horror Sci-Fi and Fantas~

I ,

TWO THEMES FOR THE PR ICE OF NONE

'here is no overall unifying theme to this in·betweener issue ... and t hen aga in there are two noose-like threads of simi larity which tie the articles together. O ne theme is Melodramatic Soap Operatics; and there's a rather vague theme of Re--doing Things.

For instance, THE BR IDE OF FRANKENSTEIN was a sequel, trying to do-over the success of FRANKENSTEIN ... and yet though it left a lump in throat, it left a lu mp in the heart, too, what with Boris Karloff's sensitive, pathetic portrayal of The Monster - and i t also resulted in a large lump in the producers' wa llets.

T hen there's the 7-loot tall FRANKENSTEIN poster, whic h is product-tested ... its artist was try ing to re-de the FRANKENSTE IN monster ... but the result, sadly. looks as jf the demented Monster was forced to watch 48 hours of cont inuou s soa p operas. Check it out on page 6 , and see if you don't agree!

The people who put out the book . TH E PULPS, to cash in on the Nostalgia Market. w ere in a sense t rying to re-do something - they wanted to do-over the success of stor ies when they first appeared , in thud-and ·blunder pulp magazines. As the book, originally $15_00, is now being rem aindered in bookstores for $6.95, we have our doubts if they succeeded .

Th en there's the n ew GREEN LANTERN-GREEN ARROW paperback book; a slight revi sion of the original comic book stories was made . .. re-writing and re-drawi ng the pa nel s, to make two comic books read smooth ly as one comix novel. And anyone who's ever read the Denny O'Neil, Neat Adams classic in-the-milking, knows that this is about the on ly series in which people act with human m otivations and emotion s. The states South of the Mason-Dixon-line, incidentally, would not d i st rib ute GREEN LANTERN-GREEN ARROW comics - seems they heard com ics exposed the subversive, radica l or ju st-p lain un-Southern sent iments of such Dixie-born and bred rad lcal s as Abraham Lincoln and Th omas Jefferson, amo ng o thers. This hurt one-quarter o f the sa les, and the series (due to f inancial difficulties) was first cancelled. But now, as THE MONSTER TI MES goes to press, we 've learned that G.L .-G .A. LIVES! . _ . in the back of THE FLASH comi x. N o t a book of its ow n , but 12 good G.L., G .A. pages are bet ter 'n' noth ing.

Now we come to the great Re-Doer of all time , ROGER CO RMAN, who made EDGAR ALLEN POE a househo ld name if you happen to live in the hou sehold o f a movie theater projec t ionist. ROllem -out-i n-a-day Roger , the cor rOSIve Corman , churned out 3/ 4 of a dozen near·grea t and not·so-near-great f i lms based on titles of Poe stories, if noth ing else. A nd good gosh ! did the stories ever resemble TV soap operas! - a person w h o'd never read Poe, on seeing these f ilms, would th ink that all the Olde Master of Terror ever wrote about was the loathsome sin of ad u ltery . Corman's Poe-aud iences must ha ve been in two camps ... those who went on to become monster f i lm buffs, and those who w ent on to watch Peyton Place. Horror o f HORRORS!

CHUC o; R Mc:N 4 UGI1TON Aim,,,. ,, fa,/o. JOE "'ANI' M.".i'1'''' EtMO' "" I.L AN "SHERMAN PHIL SEULIN Ci STEV E VERTLJE II AU/K' '' 't EtNOfl, BR ILL AND WA LDSTEIN Arr 0"«1,o,, IIILI. flOR ET DEN NY O'NEIL. C M A,CHMIDS COl" ... "",. Al.l.." N "SHERMAN JESSIC A CLER K DAVE IZZO DEA N ALPt<EOUS LATI MER EO NA,HA, C M AICHARDS STEVE vEATLlEII JI M WN OAOSKI Con" o",,"p W"'ttl J ACK J 4 CKSO .... CQllr,.ollr,,,, P"o.otp .. "ftr' LARRY W4LOSTEI .... Wr" Co. " CO"~ljlon'"''' , JE SS CII CLER< E",oPt .. " CO""PM'dM' RIC~ IIUC"'LER ERN IE COLO"'l CARLOS GARZ ON DA N GREE " STEilI' I'I'CI(M4N J"".1Y JAN ES J E~ f JONES MI"E tCALUTA GR4Y MOR ROW li B $4M$ L4RA~ TODD BERNI WR IGri TSO N Co<t",O .. /np Ar" ,jJ

The Monster

Volume I, No.4

1 THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN , The ta le of woe of one monster-maker ' s family .

6 THE MONSTER MARKET , Product test of a testy prod uct. A monster!

7 THE PUL~A -EVIEW; They were grand and gloriou5 where modern writings are bland and boring.

10 THE HERO-PULP INDEX - ANOTHER REVIEW , a book that lists titles of stor ies and authors that appeared in THE PULPS _

11 GREEN-LANTERN-GREEN ARROW BOOK NO . 1, Yet anot her book review - of a comix paperback tha i i~ mOl'e"Literatu re" than the other two books , .. ,ie'wed

15 ROGER CORMAN MEETS EDGAR A LLEN POE! The bat tle of the century! Poe lives again, sor t of. Roger Corman lives yet - very well, too .

16 GN A W ING OBSESS ION, PART ONE , A special COr'ma n-esQue, Poe-esQ ue co lo r com ic strip by Jeff Jones.

20 THE 10 CRUMBIEST HORROR FILMS OF 1971 , The awards are dubiOUS achievements, defi ni tel y, bu t everyone seem s to be compet i ng fo l' them _

22 MAIL DEPARTMENT, Learn wha t we did right, as we learn what we d id wrong, from the readers' points o f view.

23 DRACULA GOES TO COURT , T he world' s greatest and most authoritative version of DRACULA ... and we may never see it ! Why?

21/1 MONSTER T IMES TELETYPE , ~ Who need s Variety anymore,

now that you have us to report on Monst-Six?

26 TALES FROM THE CRYPT; A shl'iek preview of the film of the year .. . to EC comix fan s, sure to make gains fol' Gaines.

ArrEH7/<JN, GREtN LANTEKN <JF EAKTN.' I HAV • • .,TAfJLlSHEP

TELEPATHIC CONT.ACT Wt;H OA IN ,HE .+lATTER OF lVUR RING--

AL.-rHOLlGH THE GUARI7IANS KNOW NOT WHY >OUR RING PAI?TIAU-Y FAIL.EC', THEY HAVE

1:00CHfP AN(7THEK PECISION .. .

THIS ISSUE 'S COVER : Elsa Lanehmer & Boris Karloff in THE BRIDE OF FRANK Still collectors ma y not recognize this particular shot, wh~h is a prized resu lt of our art department layout wizards Orill & Waldstein. who also Created and Publish THE MONSTE R TIMES Yay Bosses! They also concocted the first page. a mini-calor-poster.

THE MONSTER TIMES. No . 4, March 15th, 1972 published every two weeks by The Monster Times Publish ing Company. P.O. 80x 595, Old Chelsea Station, New York , N.Y. 10011 . Subscriptions in U.S.A.: S 6 .00 for 13 issues, outside U.S.A_: $10.00 for 26 ISSUes. Second class mail privileges aut horized al New York, N.Y. and at additiona l mail ing offices . Contributions are inv ited provided return postage is enclosed ; however, no responsibility can be accepted for unsolicited material. Entire contents copyrighted. (cl 1972, by The Monster Times Publishing company . Nothing may be reprinted in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher . Subscriber change of address; give 8 weeks not ice . Send a n address imprint from recent issue or state exactly how label is addressed . Printed in U.S.A.

· ~ ..... .

The Monster Times 3

pale 4

BY ALLAN ASHEMAN

Part One: the pUlsating plot of plots

The BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN starts; re-<:apping the FRA KENSTEI film j ust for those who missed it or ca n't live without it.

We first sec an intcrc<;ling little early-1800's scene in which Mary Shelley, her husband (poct Percy Shdlcy) and a family friend (George GUIdon Lord By ron) engage in a pass-time 'ilorytclling. Becau~e of bad weather (mainly the Hollywood thunder and lightenIng so necessary to storic'i of this horrific nalu re), Lord Byron asks Mary Shelley to co ntinue her tale of the Frankenstein

"Kill him'" " Trap him" "Bind him' " " Destroy him'"

Mo nster. Did he rC<llIy die in Ihe hurni n!:! mill , or did he sOlllehow cSI.:<.I pe to wrl.!;Jk add ition<.ll h;Jvol.:?

Ah! He did OT die! Through <.I seeks o f f];Jshb;Jck s, we sec: Dr. Frilllkstdn building his monster from I.:or pscs. furn ishing it with <.I s to len hr:Jin ;J nLi e nd owing it with lift.:. It comes inl o the wo rld a p<.lthctk, mute thing with hideou!\ face and undcrdcvdopcd a imin .. ! mimI. and due to the careful tcadlings of .. sad is ti c dwarf bccomes ohscs.~cd wi th the idea of his o wn uglincss, <.Ind the pr ospec t s of findine a f ric: nd. Unfortunately t he Mo nster docs h;Jd ly <II making frie nds, managing ins le<Jd to spread qu ite a had reputalion ahead o f himself. li e does not understand why everyo ne ha tes him, and he: read s in his own dim way. He docs lill Ie irritating things lik e in t e rrupt ing marri:lges,

frightening decent women, making noise in I he middle of the night and acciden ta lly drow ning a litt le g irl . The vil l age p eople don't think him a "personality kid:' A torc hlight procession leads the 'tonster into the town mill and then sets the bui ld ing afi re. The monste r apparen tly dies a ho rrible death. Ah, but not so, .. ys dear Mary :

The monster fell through the floor of the burning m ill, and was saved by hidIng himself in the qu iet waters o f the river . Unfortunately, his hideous fa ce was scarred in the fire. most of his hair a nd some of his flesh burned away and his hands injured, fingers fused together by the awsome heat of the blaze, t he living·dead corpse-skin scarred. He is now somewha t angry at the world. to the point of killing anyone he sees.

But the first person he meets is Minnie ( U na 0 'Co n nor), the sc ream·lo ving servant of the young Baron Frankenstein.

Minnie is not all there upstairs and has been known to shrilly-shriek blood-curdlingy for fun , when monsters weren' t around to inspire her.

Even an eccentric, ki ll -crazed monster ca n recognize someone sicker than himself. Wh en the Monster sees o ld Minnie sc reaming her guts o ut, all he does is look at her thro ugh the corner of his mouth, and permit her to speed on her erratic and picturesque way.

But now back to business, and we see Dr. Henry Frankenstein apparently dead, being carried into hi~ house. Minnie runs hys tcrically in, trying to tell people she saw the Monster. Of course, no one believes her and she simply forgct s abou t t he experience mak ing no fu rther attempt to warn anyone. Told you she was sick!

Henry Frankenstein (Colin Clive) il lurns out , is not dead . There is much merry·m aking, and h is fiance Elizabeth, ( Va (eric !-i o bson) , who ncver quite managed 10 hook Henry in the first film makes a snide comment regarding the fact that this was supposed to be her wedding night.

visit of a morbid mentor

Sever<.ll bone-healing eve nings la ter ; the now·married couple are preparing to

The Monster Timei

settle down to a quiet evening in bed, when a steadfast lunatic of a man, Dr. Praetorius, enters their lives.

P rae l orius, once Henry's biology instructor, is also a doctor o f philosophy and has no trouble coping with li fe despite his one fault ... he's a nut!

Praeto rius takes advantage of Henry 's gulhbi liry and shows him his Own experiments invo lving the creation o f lifc. He has successfully crea ted tiny, living people whom he keeps locked in ja rs. He keeps Ihese jars in a coffin-shaped case (probably stored under his bed). This profound scientific exhibition Slarts the fires of curiosity bU flung in Henry again. Fo rtunately, however, he has married a re ligious fanatic. Elizabe th has cd nvinced Henry (hat it was the Devil who prompted his life·experiments. He refuses to work with Praetor ius.

Meanwhile, the Monster is cnjoying a stroll through the woods, slista in ing himself on rollen turnips and snarling at his reflection in a lake. Before he knows ii , 2 hunters spot h im, shoot him and run to get the rest of the village to do their Mon s t cr·chasing thing. The villagers o vertake lhe the Monster, capt ure him and drag him back to town. Locked securely 111 a maximum cell, with chains binding him to a huge chair, Ihe Mo nster takes 2 whole minu tes to escape, kill ing some people and causing some anxiety.

Wandering through the woods, alone and friendless, the Monster, bleed ing fro m his wounds, hears a sound that makes his mind recall beauty. It 's a soft, pulSing and welcoming sound that leads the awkward crea ture to a small building in the midd le o f the forest. There, completely cut ·off from the rest of the human race, hves a blind hermit. Because of hil' loneliness he has made his own rules rega rd ing fr iend shi p; anyone is a friend, anyone is welco mc. There is no prejudice in this man, as he ca nnot sec the ugliness that li mps into his home. He senses the need fo r rest and a kind word. The Monster hears a soft voice for the first time in his life, and begins to feel

~ .... ~ .. .... -

======~ ¥

-•

compassion for the blind man. He eats food offered to him by the blind Hermit and exhibits the 1T'0st necessary of all human reactions: trust. He cries as the Hermit thanks God for sending him a friend from out of the darkness. The Hermit plays a grea t hUI sad violin. The Monster learns to cry alol.

Time and gentleness make the Mon~ter live a peaceful existcnce with the hermit. He Icarns to speak ; first words, then clumsy sentences. The hermit has taught him to drink wine, smoke cigars and savor bread . The Monster has taught the hermit to laugh. Left alone, the peace of these two lost liouls would probably .have gone on forever. But one day 2 lost hunters ent er the cahin. They see the Monster and it dawn li on them [he hermit is blind, and rannO I IiCC the slow horror tha t is his fr iend.

Hustl ing him out of th e house, a firc starts as the ~1onstcr. for the first time, hears that he is an artificial man.

In one moment the con fu cd creature learns why he is different from ot her people. The bewi ldered ~1 onste r is too preo ,-=cu pied with this new know ledge, and the fi re, which he fearli more than anything else. He is nOI aware of the hermit being led from cabi n muttering "My friend. my poor friend." eve n with the knowledge that his friend is a manufact ured . vio lent creature , the old hermit recalls the Mo nster's genui ne urge to live in peace. He will be the only human being ever to ac hieve such a r~ltionship with the Monster ... and the

"It comes ... a figure like death ... closer ... closer ... "

- ,

Mon ster will never kn ow that, somewhere, a lonely o ld man lived out his life worrying about him .

The Monster, running from the burning cabin, meets some child ren. He tries to approach them in a friendly manner, but they are frightened. Embittered, the Monster remembers somethi ng o ne of the hunters sa id ... "Frankstein made him out of dead bodies." Dead ... DEAD. His one point of identifica tio n, of kinshIp. was with the dead. There was only one logical place for the crea ture to seek refuge and, escaping from the hun te rs and their friends , the Monster made his way into a tomb.

Think ing himself alone, the Monster breaks open a coffin, fo ndl es a dead girl'o; face, and sm ilingly whispers " friend." Suddenly he hears a noise.

To this same lo mb has come Dr. PraclOrius looking for It set of firm bonco; to serve as the framework of the artificial woman which he hopes to buLid with the aid of Baro n FrankcnMcin.

Examining the ~k cJcton he has chosen, Prac torius is unaware of th e Monster sneaking toward him in the tomb. Relishing a meal of cold chicken and wine, Praetorius, smiling, toasts the memory of The Monster. The Monster figures he has a frie nd in Practorius, and anxiously emerges from the shadows ges turing for a smoke and pathet ically saying "F riend'! "

Continued on page 28

"This gentleman is the very devil. H. tM.n an uncanny resemblance to myself, don 't you t hink?"

The Monster Times

.rave-rObbing may be out of style, but fan exploitation isn't. Monster fans deserve a reliable market·test to rely upon before sending money to all·too monstrous manufacturers. Therefore, to dull the fangs of some vampires of our industry, we at MT innovate The Monster Market to product test items, and report accurately on them-and about the bargains, too!

1M PORTANT! If we are really going to be able to keep the monster magnates in line, we' ll need your help. Please write in and tell us of your experience in the monster market, whether it be good, bad or none of the above. Write to THE MONSTER TIMES, c/o The Monster-Market, P.O. Box 595, Old Chelsea Station, N.Y. 10011 .

Product Tested: 7·foot tall MONSTER Available at: Honor House, Lynnbrook, New York, 11563 Price : $1.00 plu s 25 cents postage - or two for $2.00 plus 25 cents postage.

"H ER E I s Y o u r H i de o u s. Spin e·Chiliing, "BIGGER-THAN· LIFE" 7· Foo t Tall FRANKENST EIN Monster In All Hi s Co lorfull -Fr ightening Glory . HAPPY HAUNTING!" so screamed t he blu rb on the direct ion sheet we go t wi th our 7-foot tall MONSTER . And boy were we ever disappointed.

Why? Was t he advert isi ng false? No, but we were secretl y w ishing it w ould have been . Behold the MONSTER, p ic tur ed ,n the a dve rtisem ent reproduced here. When you look at the ad, you think, well . some real ly rotten commercial arti st no dou bt tri ed to copy the great·lookin ' monster that must be 01) the $1.00 poster. You really hope that. You hope it so strongly, you almost believe that that's what it'll be!

And then you get your 7-foot tall MON STER p os ter (in "AUTHENTIC COLORS"). and by George'! It's that rot ten drawing in th e adverti sement, bl own up SEV EN FEET TALL! And the "AUTHENTIC COLO RS "? -stomach- churning gr een. and baneful bl ack , wi th vari ous mottl ed shades of gray-green grunge and grungy green·gray between.

What's more, it 's pri nted on th in plasti c . . . in two pieces .. It has to be joined in the bell y with scotch tape.

IS IT WORTH A BUCK?

That 's argueable. Judging by how I ittle a way a dollar goes, these days; maybe. The first reacti on of ev e r yo n e w h o ente r s THE MONSTER TIMES' offices is; " Good Grief! NO!" But then we poi nt out those "G LOW in the dark eyes, " w hi ch are two li ttl e I u m i nescent sti ckem' paper dot s which fit over the monster's pupils, and do " glow in the dark" -however, . prest o! in the darkened room, all you can see are two li ttle white·ye ll ow spots on your wal l. The monster has di sappeared! He doesn't glow in the dark . So the item fulfill s all that was promised. The ad's legit.

But is it worth 'a buck? Even with glowing eyes?

And how authentic are these '''authentic'' co lors, anyway? Boris Karloff's facial makeup in the 193 1 FRANKENSTEIN f ilm was green, t o register ' cbrpse:t ike on the bla c k·and·white film . But th is 7·foot creep-ture surely ain't Bor is Karl off!

Wellp, gang! Izz it worth a w hole DOLL A R ? Auth entic colors, glo w ing eyes, an d 7- fe et? Remember; it's not too well-drawn. Remember; it's in two pieces, which YOU have t o Scotch-tape together - and if you make a mistake in taping . . . well, t he ad

MS. FRANKENSTEIN'S MONOLOGUE:

Every day it 's tbe same routine­Wake up, fix the umaster" his break fast . . .

Dusting the crypt, arranging the cobwebs just

, the way he likes them, feeding Spido, our pet spider, and Spiro, our pet boar.

the DARK EYES $1 00

ONLY Imal in. yo u, friend s shock when they see the "MDNSTE'" reachin g out _ slnisttr as Ihe wlldul nightmare. Bluer thl ll Ille- F r an kenstei n- th t m,n·mld! monsler that terrorized the world, 7 feet lall . w.th eyes !rill I IO¥!' n rlly III the da rk for a specia l ttl rill in, chili. So li fel ike in au­thentic colors, that you'll probably fi nd yoursell ta lkin, to him . Won' t you be surprised il he answers ! There IS also his Deneet companion- BONEY ttl. SI([UTON-slat_ and s tar ~-just a wonderlul 1 pair 10 set your ttai f on end. MONU IACI( ,UIUNTU Jus t send SI .OO plus 25c 10 cover pos tage a nd handl in, lor each mono ster ),ou want. ORO[ R TWO AND $AYE. (The same 2St for pos tac e and han· dlln. applies to orders for TWO MONSTE RS- a total 01 2 lor 52 .25.) Your money bac k if not

~~t~~:c~,::~lllorr i 'ied. 0['" 539MR77 LYNBROOK , N. Y. 115.3

FIGHT YER WAY OUTTA A GARBAGE BAG DEPT : No! Tha t ' s not a fug itive from a pai nti ng . Picasso , in tha t ad , abo'le. That's

r eally " THE MONSTER".

offers a post age discount i f you order t wo. Remember; it's got a ridieu lous bolt screwed right in the center of its forehead! Put it on your wall and someone's sure to say something about "having a screw loose." Remember; they might not be ta lking about "the MONSTER ."

. How many times have I heard him say ifhe doesn 't get his cup of kerosene

, in the moming he feels dead on the job all day.

Where 's the fun I was promised? Where's the fulfillment? They tell me to pull myself together, but I don't care what they say .. .

IS IT WORTH A WHOLE DOLLAR (plus 25 cents postage)?

That's for y ou , the rabid·eyed reader t o figu re out. We've given you the info. It might be worth not ing that plast ic garbage bags of comparable size cost $1.00 apiece, these days. That's something in mind, Honor House! You could sell reams o f seamed FRANKENSTEIN GARBAGE BAGS for $1.00 - and real ly (ahem!) clean up. Advert ise them as " su itable for framing, or th ro wing away ." Imagine' A garbage bag w ith GLOW in the dark eyes!

One more item of note. This plastic poster is different than an ordinary paper poster, in the way you can stick it to the wall ... " Mount him on your with thumb tac ks or Scotch tape and you'll never feel alone again. Or you can simply place him agai nst the wall and rub all over with your hand, and static electri city should hold him there. " Sure glad they said " should hold him there" - cause it surely didn 't hold him to our wall.

The point of Mary Shelley's FRAN KENSTEIN novel was that electr icity is the spark of life. That means ei ther we or our wall be dead. Somet hing t o th ink about, surely. Is it worth a buck? Yeah . . . but only if you can 't find something better.

.C.M.Richards

What about me?· A woman gets tired of spending all her time just trying to make/ife com forrahle for her mate!

Being married to him is a pretty gnwe affair:

pulps ... rotting to the corpse When he died , they put up old Skip's property at auction, and my brother-in-law bought the place cheap. The old guy had lived there for twenty-five years, ever .since 1932, on a meagre pension, and he'd seldom left it except every other Friday, when he'd walked the n ine miles down the twisting two-rut road out of the mountains to the little town, with his old hunting hound, to load up on groceries and Mail Pouch chewing tobacco and shotgun shells and new rlShlines and magazines. The dog stopped coming with him about 1950 or so, and when old Skip

Pulp magazines, or "penny dreadfuls" or " the Bloody Pulps" have a long, proud blood-and-thunder history . The pulp paper magazines and novels have been the birthplace of countless great adventure, sword & sorcery, mystery and science fiction characters, from Tarzan to Nick Carter to the Shadow to Conan. Back in the mid-1800's these inexpensively-printed magazine-novels were available for a penny apiece, and many early horror novels were printed that way; works like "Varney the Vampyr" and "Barnaby Rudge, the Demon-Barber of Fleet St reet." in the 1840's. Here, then is a review of .. . THE PULPS. Fifty Years of American Popular Culture, Compiled and edited by TONY GOODSTONE, Chelsea House, $15.00 (being remaindered now in many bookst!lres for $6.95).

didn 't show up one weekend, they knew he was gone too.

So we got the place, a sturdy little green cabio by Indian Creek,

the filthiest, most cluttered-up hermit shack you ever did see. It looked as though old Skip had spent the last ten years of his

/ J~

~\)

celibate there totally unable to bend over and pick anything up off the floor. "Tsk,' my sister kept marvelling while she was cleaning up the place, ' the poor old geezer, living way out here with nobody around for miJes. Lord , and he didn 't even have electricity, not even for a radio. I wonder how he kept from going batty. I mean , what did he do by himself all day, all alone here? He sure didn't keep himself OCCUPIed by cleaning up this pig-pen!'

But me, lying up io the loft bunk on that evil-smelling old man 's Iilattress - that's where they'd found him, lying all peaceful and stiff as a mounted rainbow trout­I had a good idea how he 'd whiled

pagel

All illustrations from "THE PULPS" (C) 1970 by Tony Goodstone, CHelsea House Pub. $15.00

a way that tobacco-chewing eternity, out there all alone in the darkest Adirondacks with Indian Creek howling and yipping along by on its everlasting warpath: damned ole Skip had been tripping out of his wrinkled ole head to places lile Pellucidar, and Mobster Chicago, and the bloody skies over war-tom Europe, and all up and down the Wild West, from Tombstone to Tacoma, in the Rush Days_ Yessir, that cabin was piled up and falling over with thousands of old pulp magazines, an exotic compost of old crumbling pulps with radiant neon co vers and brownis h raggedy-edged paper, rea king of tallow grease and mouse-droppings and ageless corruption : Spicy Det~ctive Stories, Dare-Devil Aces, Western Tale" Racketeer Storie" Parisian Life, Dime Mystery Magazine, Terror Tales, Marvel Science Stories, Nick Carter Mysteries ___ It was the Alexandria Library of old pulp magazines, Skip's cabin there; and can you imagine having an open-stacks card to the Alexandria Library? Eat your hearts out, gang!

But Old Skip-style recluses are getting rarer all the time, they're dropping like flies these days, the attrition rate is something awfuL Genuine pulp magazines are consequently quite difficult to obtain now, and, the half-life of that pulp-process raggedy-edged paper being what it was, the copies themselves are generally about as ' crumbly as the actual Alexandria manuscripts would be if they 'd

, survived. _ _ __

But don 't despair, gang! I wouldn't build you up and let you down flat! Now, thanks to Chelsea House Publishers - they who resurrected The 1929 Johnson Sm ith Catalogue - you can obtain a marvelous and elaborate volume called, simply, The Pulps. It is a massive pachyderm of a book, the size of a pauper's tombstone, and it weighs about five pounds. Edited by a New York actor named Tony Goodstone a hand so me Tarzan-like swain, to go by his dust-jacket photo - The Pulps includes stories by the likes of Robert E. Howard, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Max Brand, Luke Short, Ray Bradbury. Frank Belknap Long, Clark Ashton Smith, H .. P. Lovecraft, and Stanley G. Wienbaum, as one would expect; and also by some unexpected writers such as Tennessee Williams, Da sh i ell Hammet , Mal co l m Jameson. William McGivern and Paul Gallico. Additionally, it is generously - one might say lavishly - embellished with original pulp illustrations, including notably a splendid four-color portfoli o of a hundred pulp covers in all their exquisite tasteless garishness.

To look at these covers will break your hearts, gang. There ain 't nothing like them around no more. nowhere. The ' logos alone were marvels of calligraphy, and colored so as to shriek right off the page at you_ And the pictures, lord. the pictures: those immaculately rendered human. superhuman, and non-human figures, realistic in every last detail of anatomy and expression, but bathed. yes, bathed and dripping in that lambent chromatic radience that was unique to the pulps, and later to the comic

books . Nothing like them at aiL Those co-.ers were beautiful, and

what's more , they sold. What miserable Depression kid , picking his nose in a WP A crabgrass development complex, could have resisted , for instance, a magazine cover depicting a couple space­suited supermen dancing gracefully . over the Moon's landscape, loaded down with bizarre futuristic equipment, with the harvest Earth swimming by in the background under the Amazing logo? Or a Wierd Tales cover by Hannes Bok, showing a skeleton perched before a writing-table, entering with a quill into a nameless tome the names of

The Monster Times

the combatants fighting in the background? And to hide under the mattress, a long-legged blond wearing an abbreviated sunsuit, eating an apple. on tbe cover of Breezy Stories. They were the thirties equivalent of underground and rock-and-roll , these pulp magazine s. No matter how improvished and pedestrian things were, you could flip right out of your head on this stuff.

wing out of a nose-dive

Take for example 'The Flaming A_rrow', a story by George Bruce, from The Lone Eagle, 1934:

"SELECTED BY THE CRIME JURV"piously advertised the publisher of this wary ware. Which is good enough reason for me to buy. if the eOller skull doesn't grab my interest and my dime; if say. I'm sent to buy 8 loaf of bread with that dime, back in April ' 35.

STRANGE TALES was called a "mystery" pulp in 1919. Today it would be called fantasy or corny or something like that. It was strong competition for WEIRD TALES.

'The Nieuport went ahead with a rush. The wires were screeching. The motor moaned and whined. The tight surfacing of the wings drummed. The slipstream that came back into his face was like a hand c lamped over his nostrils and mouth .

'The stacks grew nearer and nearer. He saw the first buildings of the factory rising out of the horizon. He kicked a little rudder to aim his flying projectile at the exact centre of the group of buildings.

'He was intent upon his course. ' He never heard the Fokker that

dropped in behind him until the whiplash crackling of slugs sounded about his head, and until he saw a tracer fli ck through the top wing on the Nieuport and expLode into tiny bits of phosphorescent smoke. He whirled in his in his seat with a

The Monster Times

What with "II that talk about "gratuitous violence" corrupting our nation's youth, we need onlV look to this 1935 eover of HORROR STORIES. I think that we will all agree, class, that HORROR STORIES' illustrator JOHN NEWTOWN HEWETT painted more gratuitous violence here than there is to be found in a day of news coverage . A fun psychologic.l game; which of thltSe people would you like to be?

SECRET AGENT"X". was but one of dozens of sensation "detectives" of 1934 who today would only feel at home in the pages of TH E MONSTE R TIMES, if anywhere.

violence that twisted his neck. ' He saw the Fokker. It was close

- a hundred and fifty feet behind him. At the first glance the Fokker seemed to be a thing of great eyes, and the eyes were squirting an o range- gr ee n ven o m a t h is N i e u port. The eyes were the mu zzles o f twin Spandaus , and the man who handled them was an expert. And he was sco ring points.'

Now t h at ' s prose! Brief , irridescent, aggressive sentences, mostly beginn ing with 'He' ! That's read ing prose, prose to be sucked up in to the reader 's head like one long strand of spaghetti, devoured quickly and endlessly , sentence and paragraph! It was punched out in t ruckload lo ts by the old pulp writers, many of them composing upwards of thirty pages a day, seven days a week' Today, if one of your typical artisy-flatusy writers

In April 1926. Hugo Gernsback started AMAZING STORIES, which runs to this day . SF was called "Scientification," then . This cover Wu's H .G. Walls "War of the Worlds."

page 9

was asked to compose anything of this sort, he would directly fall into a seething, bubbling, outraged convulsion of writer's cramp_ But

these old pulp word jockeys just rammed it right on out, spinning the old prose like flax, and the pulp-reading public wore it straight

on down. Sentence by sentence the fiction would thread up off the page into your head and usually by

the end of a paragraph you would have forgotten forever the beginning of it; that's the way Homer sang, the way the old Norse eddas we.re chanted, it's the best kind of literature ever.

TERROR TALES was, like STRANGE TALES, trying to cop the WEIRD TALES market, as well as the "spiey" market, too. It had WEIRD monsten & "Spicy" ladies.

a word from CONAN's creator:

" By Ymir, it was a battle to madden and make drunken with the slaughter and the fury. The Picts were as ferocious as we, but ours was the superior physique, the kee ner wit, the more highly developed fighting-brain . We won because we were a superior race t

but it was no easy victory_ Corpses littered the blood-soaked earth; but at last they broke and we cut them down as they ran, to the very edge of the trees. I tell of that fight in a few bald words. I cannot paint the madness, the reek of sweat and blood, the panting, muscle-straining effort, the splintering of hones under mighty blows, the rending and hewing of quivering sentient flesh ; above all the merciless abysmal savagery of the whole affair, in which there was neither rule nor order, each man fighting as he would or could . _ . So we cut down the fleeing Picts, and our women came out On the field to brain the wounded enemies with stones, or cut the.ir throats with copper knives. We did not torture_ We were nO more cruel than life demanded . "

- Robert E_ Howard, "The Valley Of The Worm"

So the only trouble with The Pulps here, as a volume, is that you don 't get enough of it_ To be sure, you get about two hundred pages of spaghetti prose, and what pages! But I have the feeling that any real pulp-reader could glom up two hundred pages of prose on the school bus of a winter morning_

. - D_A_Latimer

~ [

t ~

I I I I I I

page 10

You 've read the b ooks ! Now read the handy reference book! Just to know which of TH E PUL PS you've read , 'which you haven't. and which to collect, it pulp-collecting's your th ing.

A REVIEW . •.

THE HERO·PULP INDEX. Compiled by Robert Weinberg, with Lohr McKinstry. Opar Press 1971, 48 pages. $3.50.

The best feature of the Hero Pulp Index is the idea behind its creation . Two dedicated fans of the old pulp magazines, Roben Weinberg and Lohr McKinstry, are responsible for putting together a fine informat ive little book which serves the double purpose of being a research tool for those of us who wish to devote our eff o rt s to col lecting, reading, and

preserving the pul p magazines of the 1920's and 1930's, and bei ng a conversation piece for those of us who dig nos ta lgia and lowest-common­denominator publ ishing and who want

sports, or locomotive out could read his fi ll each month , and the fantasy field

alone fragmen ted down into dozens of su b-categories. Sword and sorcery. Oriental tales, fantasy. " hard" S-F, horror. ghost stories, mysterious heroes -each of these exotic subjects had its

fai thful lo llowing. The Hero Pilip Index would be of

pri mary interest only to those who focused their, search for enjoyment on the

hero-oriented stories. especia ll y those in series. Here you will find for example list ings of all t he stones wri tten by Walter Gibson about the famous Shadow. And that 's quite a listi ng! Gibson alone wrote 285 Shadow novels, and other writers added more, creating a total of 325. Each one is listed by book, all thor, title, and date.

it 's amusing to scan the titles of these novcls, not only the Shadow stones, but oth ers. You can dri ft off on your imagination reading such lovely titles as The Book of Death, The Green Terror, The Crystal Skull, and Ghoul's Carnival, to name only the tiniest fragmen t .

Two other features add to the book's wor th. Each o f the heroes in the Index has a healthy paragraph of biography in the 13·page "Guide to the Hero Pulps" sect ion in the back, explaining who he was, what his powers were, what his gimmick was, etc. And throughout the book there are 16 well -chosen samples of

, ~

THE LONE RANGER eel 1937 TROJAN PUBLISHING CO' I ,an a scant 8 issues, Pulp artist ... J . Wa~ did this coyer. The author is said to be F,.,.. Strike,.

our conversation to be factual enough. Pulps were produced by the hundreds

and hundreds of thousands. When browsing th rough back-date magazine stores , or a science-fiction deale r's wares at a convention, we can almost believe there wer~ as many different titles as there were books printed I Every cowboy,

pul p cov ers; good reproduct ions on permanent st ick paper. They sat isfy ingly

set the Nostalgia Gland throbbing. It is a little (18 page ) gem, and you 'll

get good value from it , especiall y since it's not just a one-t ime pleasure, but a treat to be often repeated. •

- Phil Seuling

- .... ~-""-.......... .# ... .. -

YOIJ' IU~ '11D~ III~U) )IONSI'lnU Y ep, you are the Head Monster,

around· here, as far as we're concerned . You , the Reader . You , the Subscriber. You, who digs mons ters and horror and science fic t ion and fantasy in movies & comix & TV & records & books: the whole carnival·tul of wonders that is the Mass-Media Renaissance of this century. These modern, imaginative wonders were­made for You, and Your Journal , THE MONSTER TIMES, is also made for YO Ul We gather news and info about them for You!

We've got an overload of materia l, and don' t know where to begi n . We've got so much great stuff on hand, and so many SPECIAL ISSUES already in the works

' (like a FLASH GORDON ISSUE, and a FRANKENSTEIN ISSUE, and a RAY 8RADBU R Y I SSUE, and an EC HORRO R COMICS issue or a TARZAN, EOGAR RICE BURROUGHS issue, and . .. well we don't want to tell you too much , some of the competition may be reading! l. and we've got so many special features in the works, too.

We are planning more columns, reviews, news scoops, listings of events of interest to practicblly every imaginable sort of fan. We've got special new sideline publications planned . . . top secret stuff, and we've even planned a special X-mas supplement combination gift-buying guide of monster products and curios and a section we cheerfully call TH E MONSTER T IMES REV IEW OF BOOKS, for those who still read, these days. This should make the New York Times turn

green with envyl We've got comix and comis and more

of same; no matter how you spell 'em, you'll be getting them. We've go t so many posters planned that you ' ll have to rent a warehouse to hang them all up.

Like we said, we've got more stuff t han we can get into pri nt right away . And we want to please you! You're the Head Monster !

So write us NOW! T ell us what you want to see f irst, and we' ll comply.

Tell us how certain artic les strike you , or if you would like to st r ike them . Rate us fro m A-Z, and spell out exactly how you li ke or d is like our presentation of Strange Stuff.

We particularly want to know about

__ Classic Horror Sci-Fi Films.

__ Articles on Comix.

_ _ Original Comix .

__ News.

_ _ Film, Book, Record reviews.

_ _ Product Tests.

__ Interviews.

__ Other (specify )

Name' ________ A9L--1

Addressi __________ 1

I City' __________ 1

State' _______ ZiP' ___ 1 THE MONSTER '!IMES P.O. Box HI.

~d~...!ta~,~y.~!!.. __ 4J

'-"

GIVE A DAMN! " AS I WAS FLYING THRU THE SLUMS ONE DAY " DEPARTMENT: Let's say you're an average red·blooded green American he-he ro, and on some stroke of luck for years you 've been flying about with long green BVO's and a magic power ring that helps you fight crooks, right? And all this time you th ink " Hey . I'm a little short of wonderful! " Until one day you discover you ' re a little short of brain one . Like, there you go, flying all over the place, beating up alien invaders from other planets (which is kneal , cause so many of your comic book cronies are still fighting Nazis, and winning WWII with their fists). But all along something 's been happening and you don 't know what it is . Something like slums, and poverty, and pollution and city corruption and heroin add iction and all those things which used to be problems long ago. Long ago, and hoped forgotten .

So, like I said, one day you discover they're still with us. And all this time you went around saying, " NO EVIL SHALL ESCAPE MY SIGHT" as your power ring poofed you powerful.

Then one day you seem some young punk beating up one of those respectable citizens; a slumlord, no less. One who gouges on rent and doesn't deliver on the improvements. So you swoop down and wallop the street punk kid, right? I mean who's HE to go pushing a respectable well-dressed slumlord around, right?

And all the neighbors in the slum are thankful you got one more juvenile delinquent menace off their tenement steps. No more crime in the streets. And no evil escaped YOUR sight , right? And the slum tenants show their thanks .. .

Continued on next page

12

GREEN LANTERN CO·STARRING GREEN ARROW, No. I, by Denny O'Neil & Neal Adams, edited by Julius Schwartz. Paperback Library, 75 cents.

8REEN LANTERN·GREEN ARROW was one of the greatest comic books of all times. Was, because that act ion·sci·fi ser ies has been cancelled. The artist, Neal Adams, fail ed to meet his deadlines, and so the book is dead. Th is is inside scam of the publishing industry, which only THE MONSTER TIMES dares to print abou t the b ig comix comglomerates! Remember : you read i t here!

Is the folding of GREEN LANTERN·GREEN ARROW news? Yes, it's heart·breaking news for anyone who followed the series. They were a mature experiment in "involved" com ix . .. with characters who get drawn into the real problems of today, instead o f corn·ball beat·up·the-jewel·thieves·at·the·wharf sort of stuff. For over one glorious year, author Denny O'Neil and gifted illustrator Neal Adams made history for Com ix, and created a landmark for others who deal in comic book work to try to approach. Just try!

The greatest thing about the late, great, GREEN LANTERN·GREEN ARROW (above all the redeeming social importance, con t rovers ial causes, the trend'setting art, the incredible hand-to·hand soc kemu p fighting sequences, and moral lessons about the nec~ssi ty of peop le to think individually, and not follow the herd) was the emotion which the characters felt and made you, the reader feel. Particular ly when Green Lantern learns to be self·rel iant again and f igh t with his fists, instead o f with his power·ring. Or when an alien from a superior civiliza ti on tries to comfort a frightened chi ld, and the ch ild hugs h im, and the alien wonders: "A strange feeling ... an emotion ... as this tiny Earthling

AfEANWHIIL, iN A $FaJ/WP Sl'r)T M THE R:l7r OF me "'Lt. ...

THE GREEN LANTERN OATH suddenly seemed to mean som.thing .. . and to mean next to nothing, all at the same t ime. one day. And the comix haven't been the same since. Her. THE GREEN LANTERN saga beg.n to mean something to read.". tho , and in time the series won several comie .rt fan & pro awards.

embraces me - is th is what it is t o be human? So, poverty and tenements are good - for one

issue. What' s nex t ? Right away, poor mine·workers slaving in a company town that's run by the man who owns the mines ... and who "elected himself" sheriff. In other words :

He is LAW! This is l ike the o ld song, "Sixteen Tons," where coa l·workers "owe their sou ls to the company store" - someth ing that happens (amazingly!) to this day in the Southern Appalachian coal·m ining regions. Yes, today! Not as drastically as in Denny's story , but close!

ORIIN LANTERN'S DILEMMA •.• should he be responsible only fo r the fate of planets and the universe in general, and tet individual. fend for '--'ws? Or shou ldn 't he? Anyone can be dragged down from the sky. sometimes. In the coune of the series. GR EEN LANTERN and GREEN ARROW went on an uneasy·ridet" trek across America , and " done considerable" not only for Black skins, but Red and White ski nn ed people, too.

~ roNo CONSIc>fK­PVIlPlE SK/NS.'

'5 SKINS >OU SOTHEREC7 WITH"!

The Monster Times page 13

Illustrations from GREEN LANTERN, CO-STARRING GREEN ARROW, (el 1972 National Periodical Public8tions, Inc.

"your turn, YMI filthy .f ... "

YOU EXPECT ME TO Fl'\S5 A FAT PROFIT 'CAUSE A LOT OF WORTHLE$S OLP GEEKS ARE GONNA GET ,JU/KEP ON !'

WHY NO'T,

TOU6l<Y ' ~ti;i_~J>_ YoU " AFAAJC1

>t?U'LL. PVIS£,"

111\ Ih"" 1'1

DIALOGUE WITH A CAPITAL "DEFT" ... was one of the hallmarks of the GL ·GA book, as samples on this page indicate. Our particular fayorite is; " YOUR turn, you filthy heap of . .. "

The story was called "Journey to D esolation" and when you finished reading, you reall y feel you've " been there,"

That's because Denny O 'Neil is an auth or, no t just a pennies-per-word comix hack. H e fee ls what he writes, and writes about situations which everyone can identify with . Comic book superheroes went through a "relevancy" act a couple. of years back, and Marvel led the way, w ith the frustrations of Peter Parker, alias, the SPIDER MAN. When SPIOERMAN sold, Marvel had ALL its costumed crusaders "have feelings" - but "feelings" are hard to manufacture, and so most of what passed for "emotion" in Marvel Superheroes was self-pity , And so we saw the-

weird spectacle of the strongest superheroes in the world wh impering and sniveling about the How the World Doesn't Understand Them. Nat io na l DC Comix tri ed that schtick, also, ano had their heroes cry to themselves alot, too. But that didn't seem to be the solution and comix sal es dropped off for both concerns.

Th en D enny O'Neil wrote a GREEN LANTERN story, "No Evil Shall E'scape My Sight!" - and gave a superhero something to be worried about, for a change, Like what really is Evil? And Good? Is a slumlord who's legally evicting poor tenants to build a parking lot, a better person than the tenants who want to beat him up for shoving them, homeless, out on the

streets? And O'Neil did research, and artist Neal Adams photographed real tenements in New York's East Village to get the feeling of realism to his drawings. This was no slap-dash affair. This was a comic that was FOR REAL

Both "No Evil Shall Escape My Sight" and "Journey to Desolation" are included in this paperback book, billed as "two complete novels" although the break in the narrative has been smoothened by re-writing and new art, so i t's one smooth flow , This book is' the first of a series - the next due o'ut "soon" - following the further wanderings of Green Lantern and Green Arrow, as they travel across America, trying to discover "what is wrong" with their country .. , our country . .. trying to find out what really IS Good, and what IS Bad, and what is (to quote the author) the "hideous moral cancer that is rotting our very souls!"

If you missed the series in comic book form, you can have it now, as the paperbacks are released, Let me spoil your fun , though : they never find that " hideous moral cancer " - that is, i f there is a "hideo,IJs moral cancer " to f ind at aiL Times have always been t ough, gang. They've been worse back in the days when you could have been burned at the st ake for read ing THE MONSTER TIMES. The great th ing about GR EEN LANTERN-GREEN A RROW, when it was al ive, was that superh eroes were fi nally paying attention to the prob lems of the real wor ld, and using people o f th is w orld who have rea l emotions, and real feelings, and rea l exciting storytelling,

Those of our school aged readers with who are courageou s souls are recommended to try someth i ng outrageous do an in-depth boo k-report on G. L .- G.A. for your Engli sh t each. Just i fy th is revolut ionary acti on w ith quotations of the fine-quality writing style which author O'Neil employs, as his description o f a company coal-town : " A tiny hamlet nestled between two dun-colored mountains .. , a place where poverty is the norm, and tea rs are more plentiful than bread . . . w here women's voices sound like the keening wind and men seldom speak , . , and children quickl y learn that life is unending and death is merciful , . ," Writing like th is in a COMIC BOOK! - fergoshsakes!

I n case you r Engl ish teacher doesn't read O'Nei l (Denny, rather than Eugene) fill her in. Green Lantern is a human who inher its a power ring and lantern from a dying alien , For years, now, he 's been taking orders from The Guardians .. . alien super-intellects who send him all across the universe . .. NOW he's back on Earth, refu sing to "follow orders" of The Guardians quit bei ng inter-galactic messenger-boy, and instead will use his powers to help those in Ameri ca who need his super-help; minorities, poor people, drug addicts (in a recent issue of G.L,-G .A ., it is discovered that Speedy, kid ass istant to Green Arrow, has become a junkie! - ) . On thi s Quest, he takes along Green Arrow, and one of the inter-galactic Guardians.

Gee, wi sh we had a real Green Lantern and a rea l Green Arrow around to help us all. But what I wi sh even more is that genius illu strator Neal Adam s made his deadlines, so that one of the finest comic books of all time would still be in publi cation. Boo, Neal Adams!

_-Chuck McNaughton

page 14

~O@~OF~[S fROM o:1lJl@i9 TO ~LJ1[J) H:lrve~ Kurtzman's bril liant talent has lau nched such per­

mane nt ~grnCn!s of the American idiom as MAD ma~3zinc . H U MBUG, TRUMP, H ELP. 3nd LlTTl.E ANN IE FANNY,

The time has again come for ,mother Kurtzma n .::re:ll ion! This Time the Kurllma n touc h gi\"r~ birt h In the fi rs t bible of comic boo'" atl. .. A HISTORY OF CO,\lIC ART "FROr-.f ARGII TO ZAP!"

In th ." superh 9 x 12 hardcover. Ilan'cy Kurtzman carefully [,na lylc, the cI:;~:; i;; work of [he gre;] ! corn ie hook anislS. His commcntarv de lichtfully cil rr ie .. VO II rrom the 11:,wn o f the Golden Aie of ("omil' book art t'o Ihe curr ent E!cniu<; of the IIIll.kq:roun,1 . lrIi <;I ~ . .

OVloIr 15 t.' nl ire "lOric!\ h;,l'': heen full y n::prlhluccd .li rc~· tly from .he ori;;i n31 .h "lO.lng', Hen: Yo'U hil\T Cllm r 1elc:: stnries hy FRANK FRAZI::rr.'\. AI. W ILI.IAt-. ISON . WOY KW EN­t..: E J . JAn..: D.·' V IS. t...iRA HA\1 INGLIS \-V .. \LLY \\'oon. ROA f RT C R. L: MB , HA RV EY r..: U RTZ~IAN , rlu~ many. man y ol her ~ .

('UffHRm .' · /1 ']08 IJ{I!,;/' I ( Ifl ill filII color) $14 .95

Now at last Ihe companion volume to our first · unfo rgettable FLASH GORDON edition is available! The full development of Alex Ra~momrs illustrative geni us is d ram atically rl'produccd in th is 9 x 12 hardcover volume. A complele two and a half yeaTs of FLASH GORDON have been painsllkingly reprinted from thl! o riginal proofs

beginning wilh FLASH's entr<lI1Cl.· into the Watcr World iJ'" . al April 12 . 193610 his ba nishment 10 the Forest . ~- ,.... '. Kingdom of Mongo 00 O<:lober 10. 1938. This tiurprisc • . packaj;cof 1971 is ready forimmediatt:: sh ipme nt . ",,! . ~' , . .-

CLOTHBOUND - I44 pog.. S12.95 :~J,i.' '

O,m 1M li,hh ~nd .1cr.c 1m H d on .. ~ ~ Ih ,.". F ETln F01. KTALES ot the 19Stl\ . b" bt>l~ fotl h in FU Ll. COLO ~ 110m Ihe ,.·,I , b\ I \·~ Yklr(>n. A 'fkC h (>n 01 II\(. , rnlt" -.c: .rt \lor It . hom ;,i H .. t,U"-I r OF FI' .'R. T ... l F" ~ .-F~OM ~IIE C RYPT, ~»d VAULt OF HOROII. .•. lncluJm' ~ I~r t ""pub· h.J!-.J TERROR TALE.

CLOTlIBOU!'-'D-I08 ptJ,U S1 9.95

FANTASY FOTOS SET I: C APT. MARVEL, MR . SPOCK, FRANKENSTEIN'S MONSTER

The real thing! Actual Giant-Sized 8"xI0" photographs of the most popular heroes of the century. Capt. Marvel , who thrilled millions during the '40's; Mr. Spock , the futuristic folk hero of today; and the immortal creat ion ; Frankenstein's Monster. . .. S3.00

An cX':lting bi·mt> nthly puhlic;J t.on lkdi_ calcd 10 reprinlin b, the c!:i5..";cs or the comic ~trip from Ihe 1930'~ lind 1940·s. AI~ .. dy p!:tnoed for the nr 't i<...~uc~ :Ire Alex K.IY_ mond's R IP KIRBY. vin la~e rOPEYE, the d :ll l y FLASH ( iORDON, M l r--;UTE ~OVI F.s . GASOLIN E AI.I.EY , BIUCK HRADFORD, SEC HE"I MiENT X·~ The PHA~TOM and m:w y <-.ther classics! '

Sing/, ( ",{I), S3 .00

'2001 : A SPACE ODYSSEY' POSTCARD SET 4 beautiful extra large

postcards from the greatest SF movie of our times. Send them to friends, relatives; they'll know your ahead of your time. Buy 2 sets - one for your room.

The Monster Times

8;.\~;1l~~ I~ .-, ~" " :: - ~'. ~JOE9MON"'<dJA!KKIRBYf fT?j In 1941 1\\0 0. thl.' gll.'al ~ s l superhero Io,.: Jm~ \\ t::fl! h0 fn

<,i m ul!:t!lCDllsl\" . . . SI\ION ;lI1d KIRBY Olnd C APrAIN A r. rER­lC'A ;\nd BL:'r" Y~ Working lo,!;cther for onl y 10 issues of C APTAI;-.1 A\iERI CA . S:moll (lnd K irby's dynam ic art istry soarell 10 In:. t;ml :'ll C":-l· ~ ~. T hi, dCrll~e R'l2 :or. 1 t clot hbound collector's cd lllon has r..:rrint..:d Ihl' grc ;J tl' :. t ,tutic,,- of thmc fi rs t J U issu..:s of ( . '\PTAI~; A ~'I E W I( ' A! T his Il~ p:l;;C honanz;.! bri ngs \'0 11 tho! OR I GI~ of both ("A PTA I ~ A :\ I ERICA a nd th~ RE'D SK l: I.l .. '11l E RETC RN O F T H E RE D SKULL, HO.O~OR HOS I' II ,\L . ('.\PTAl l' A ~"E It I C,\ ,\ IEETS THE FA~G . as \, ..:]] as m311\ Olh!;r .... !Onl'~ fn' m lh"l f,[c.-~ 0 1 Simo n .IJld Kirby's CAPT AIN ' A :'>f ER IC1\ !

C LOTJlBOI./ XD ! 28 pni}l!.\' 56 .95

ALEX RA VIIIONO'S

Lf~~~!]] @~U'\l~

.... 1(' lI.. ymond '" ii-' i n ,II",, ":U::"\ l!l y.trU .... II" FU\ SII (,OIl.OON rwm l hr I~~(r> .... r. ulllqur o .mpl.- ,,! CCnll. i rl Ih.1 \l rl' NJ'nnd Cam;- An'" I-'op .nlo ,lit Ir.lm of t-Inc Ar1 '\.t:. 1'1~\h. D"t. and Or . lar~o~ balli. ,h. ,~ranl \1onl ,n l ila h ~nlho rr:. ~ " , I ~ h~rJc.>vCf COn • • II,,·, .J,hOfl E,U& -A blo,'IJlh y (If A le.< I(:.ymond hy AI W,II,am" ,n

CLOrH80UI'.' ()

$12.95 II, /",, · ,r . /r { .. 'I" ' .. " IA,'"", I

~ The ~ign of the PH ,\ NTOM 1dr h ... "

meant excilement [or leader!> all over Ihe

world C\'cr loincc il ficsl appa.cd! Now on

80 Ihrill-~cked page5 follow THE GHOST WHO WALKS through one of his best ad ·

"enlures from the ' 30's~

PAPERBOUND 80 PORt'S

$3.00

Ouantity

payable to:

PLEASE PRINT

Ship To:

THE MONSTER TIMES Dept. NB4 P.O. Box 595 Old Chefsea Station New York, N.Y. 10011

Nam •...................................... ... .. ....... ..... ...•.

Address. •........... .....................•. _ ...... , ... ......... .

City .............................. ............................... .

s ...................................... ... .. .. Zip ••••. • .•

CI>OIi {" ~uip~ h .• 'r ne··~· r tx' ~' n fhe same 'HI,'C Ihal ,!.I) in t ~ .l ': when T ary Lee :l nJ P.,I I< j.,u ,.llkll Inlo' th.: ( ' h ill,' So!J ! View thOi O ll, n t .I~ il 1'0' :15 and norr "' ill Ix- again as T EI<WY A"\l 1J T HE !' IH A·II--.S ')CI sail :I~ .. III II I ;-.I"~ l a l fl: i .1 I" C." · h.IHk.lVer V, ']UIllC 1>lll1o: , n~ you Ihis. ' trip from its very /irJI day! I' rum Oct. 22. 1934 tn Dcc. 13 . 1'))5.

l"I .(JT II Hf)U.VD- J% paKrr S12.50

When these two h;\!s

get lossed into the ring. anything caR . happen

and usuillly docs! Lte Falk hilS been mi King

the real and the fantaslK! for years e"er since

(9)4! Phil Da"is added the art that kept

MANDRAKE THE MAGICI,\N RlIed with

excIte ment! See ho ..... it aJi began.

CLOTHBOUND- 96 pusn S5.95

Title

All orders shipped promptly.

·,f not satisfied for any reason you may mum your books within two weeks for a mund

Order T oul •••••••••.••••••••••••••••. .....•...... . _ ..•••..•. _.

Handling Charge ... ...•..........•..... .. .. _ •...•.•..... 45 Pa.tlge. add

25c per item ... _ .. ..• __ •.. __ ....•.....•.•.. .•.........

N.Y. Residents add Salas Tax ......... _ ....... _ ......•.. ...•.. _ .. .. .

Amount Endosed (no""'" pi_I .................................... ..

•

The Monster Times

Roger; ill Corman to the Rot!

T he re 's been a lot of talk over th e pas t fe w )' e a rs abo ut Roge r Corman. the aging bo)' wonder of the Grade-B film . Some critic s hail him as a horror genre genius. Oth· e rs bla st him as an overrated hack. Mo s t m ai n tai n an in -be tw e en posi tio n . With all th e rea m s of Co rman-cop y rolling off th e presses of late, Corman ha s at the

of mIxIng genius with mediocrity , tension with melodrama, origi­nality with cliche; his worlds could flow or collide, often witflin the pages of the same short story or even in th e same para­graph .

The same holds true with Corman in the film medium.

Roger (I can afford to be famil ­iar with him since I've never met the man) can turn out an occasion­al film of brilliant quality. of haunting bea uty. of hones t t e n­sion. of chilling terror but where yo u find pearls you might also find s win e. a nd Cor man ' s churned out mo r e than hi s sha re of sausage. Again . lik e Poe . he often mixes both , unintentionally I tru s t. With in th e sam e film .

Corman s fir s t e ffort wa s an independentl y produ ced and fo r­tunattl v for go tt e n bomb e nti ­li ed ,It,1 () f/Si t' r From I he O cean Floof . s tarring a t h en~unknown actor (who manilged tn reta in the s tatus )

/ ' named St uar t Wad e and it \\' as re ­le a sed in 1954 . Shor tl y af l e r thi s

happen out there!" said Paul Dubov in THE DAY THE WORLD ENDED, turned into the hKJeous radiation-bloated Mushroom Monster seen here .

very least sec ured for himself the title of Hollywood ' s most over­publicize d un s ung producer.

It seems to m e that Roger Corman is so m e what lik e his be r o. old Edgar Allan Poe himse lf. In more ways than one - although admittedly on a considerably smaller scale . Poe was capable

Corman we nl tu work for thc ~ - oriented American - International Pictures which had just begun its initial operation and with whom he is s till affiliated . Here Corman turned. and som etimes churned out a vast number of features in differ­ent genres, including westerns I The Gunslinger. Apache Woman).

crime capers ( Mal'hin,' Gun Kd/l'. Thunder Over Hawaii), ancient spec­tacles (A lIas - one of his better films by the way), pulp adventure ( The Sh,' Gods oI Shark R "':I and TIl,' Saga vI Thl' Viking Wom<'fl And Th"ir Journey To the Walt no/the Greal Seu Serpenl - which is not even worth

page 15

forgettable with the notable ex­ception of one scene in which a contaminated c haracte r (Paul Dubov ) is slowly changing from man to mutant. Spending his days foraging through the polluted wasteland outside the shelter, he re turns to his human companions

"My idea of a horror flick's a Bugs Bunny film festival :' said the alien carrot-creat ure to lee Van CI~f .

in Roger Corman's immortal classic film, IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE, and then some!

.I uy i ng , no less see ing ) . and j uvenile delinquent thriilpr efforts (R o('k All ,Vighl'svroril,l'rjirl ,. But the hor ror film seemed to be Corman ' s first lovc , and s trongpoint. even from the beginning .

Betwee n 1955 and 1959 Corman unleashed such fetching titles as Teenage Caveman. War of the Satel­lites, Bucke t of Blood. The Wasp Woman . Th e Beast From Haunted Cave. Day the World Ended , It Con­q ue red th e World , The Beast With a Million Eyes , and many , many oth­ers. The quality of these early quickies varied greatly from film to film . II Conquered Ihe World (1956 ) worked on a cheap and ab' urd premise and featured a monster from Venus that looked like a vegetable dealer' s nightmare - a giant carrot with a hideou s face and telepathic powers . Yet the cut­ting on II Conquered Ihe World was great-fast-paced and tEnse and at times littlE short of brilliant.

Th e Da y th e W orld Elided ( 1955 ) wa s a little nu c lear parable a bout th e last peo pl e on Earth (and a particularly obnoxious bunch at that) that was entirely

each ni ght to sleep. One night he comes in and th e he r o ( Ri c ha r d De nning ) as ks him what he doc s oul th e re. In the da rk s tilln ess of th e be d roo m . the se mi -mutant , hi s face sca rred by radiation. turns to our hero and sighs: " Wonderful things happen out there ," The cryp­tic r efe rence to the primeval world outside the she lter achieves a truly chilling effect , and Cor­man ca rri es it off r e markabl y we ll. Such moments , howev e r , we re all too rare in the early Corman productions .

More interesting were Corman ' s Filmgroup Co. productions. Film­group was a spin-off from Ameri­can'- International and turned out ' three films - two horror corrie­dies ( The Lillie Shop oI Horrors and Creature From the Haunt ed Sea) and one end-of-lhe-world affair called The L.ast Woman On Earth .

With those minor successes under hi s be lt , Roger Corman intro­duced himself (a nd vast audiences of thrilled mon ster fans) to Ed­gar Allan Poe.

Continued on page 18

page 16

ALL RIGI-lTS R!;:.5t;:RVE:D

/ I-IENR'f! GH OUT 01= THAT CHAIR TI-I15 I NSTAm ! DO I \.lAVE TO SrAND OVER YOU INCESSANTLy. ALWAY5 ~RITTERING AWAYYOURTIME wrn~ THAT ••• nAT VUf..GARTRA5K.

HEHRY! E:E.1Il ... oTOPIT, HENR'Y t YOU GET YOUR WORiHL.E55 \.lANDS OFF ME! HEMRY! ...

I'VE Ht-DIT, YOU DAMNSIlREW. HAD IT TO HERE' WITIiYOUR NAGGIH6.l. Blrc"ING. ALWAY5 ON ME. I)EUTTLING MY HERO, E[X,AAALlAN~.

IT'S BEEN ALM05'T A MONTH NOW­AND YET IT SEEM:' UKE ONL)' yE":>TERDAY ...

POE WOULD HAVE \(I\l()WN WI-IAT TO DO WITI-I YOU­B'TC~!

The Mo ...... Times

" H~NRY MORlAM! YOIJ USTE:N! LOOK AT ME. WHEN I oPEAK TO yOU.

'"

....

~, ~"'" ~."

~

I \

I nUNKWE HAD BETTER GO INTO THE: CELLAR.

A TURN OF THE WRIST AtlDTHE: HEAVY IRON DOOR WAS (...OCKED BEHIND THEM.

- ----' /

Not HENRY STOPI I'M AFRAID OF YOU , HENRY!

I'M GETTING OUT OF HERE. 1'1'<\ I NOTG ·· OHHH.

THE KEY 511 PPW ~ROr-tl HER H i\ND AND INTO THE 6oTTOMlE5,;) PIT .

AND THE.Y DESCENDED INTO THE CELLAR WHERE HENRY NORMAN HAD BUILT POE'S lbR1l.iRE M,\CHINE'S.

/

"

page 17

HENR'/ ?WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOIN6.

J.lE'Y! COME BACK HERE WlrH THAT KEY.

YOU FOOL \ NOW WE'RE BOTH LOCKE.D DOWN f-IERE ! TORTURE.'5 TOO GOOD I=OR'IOU! BUT I f.lAVE A SPECIAL TREAT , MYDEAR . . . HA! HA! POE WOOLD I-lAYEBEEN PROUD OFME.

. page 18 The Monster Times

ROGER CORMAN MEETS

... Rats ... their sharp fangs in my fingers E ALLAN POE Continued

from page 15

Connan's first attempt at captur­ing the world of Edgar Allan Poe on the screen was The HOl/se of U,her . a shortening ot Poe's original title The Fall Of . . . etc. Most critics agree that The H()use o( UshN was a pretty successful screen grafting of the original Poe material. being fairl y faithful to the original and featuring some fine atmospheric sets with , of cou rse. the perennial fog machines pumping madly away throughout the proceed ings - as they wou ld throughout most of Cor­man's Poe adaptations (in fact I wonder if Vincent Price could find his way if he didn't have an eerie fog to stealth through).

haunted by terrifying demons of his own design . In hi s portrait of Roder­ick Usher. who suffers from fit s of extreme catatonia resembling the death state. Poe describes a man perched at the outer edges of ago­nizing pleasure and unspeakable pain. the helpless victim of the as­saults of both .

Price as Usher looks the ul timate portrait of self-contained suffering as he exhibits the pale but striking elegance of the damned . Sights and sounds and smells continuously at­tack his defenseless senses . Sights too vivid , too bright sear his sensi­tive eyes . burn his retina. blind the raw exposed nerves of his brain: sounds knife their W3V through the delicate membrane of hi s ears . smells choke his nostrils and bully his imagination : everything he per­ceives can turn on him in an instant to strangle his shaky and dwindling sanity .

For Roderick Usher , life is a permanent bad trip, with death and worse - the cata tonic state and the possibility of being buried alive -

"I heard her first feeble - movements- in the coffin ... we had put her living

in the tomb!" p - oe

Price is well cast as Roder ick Usher, a man tormented by the ago­nizing sensitivity of his own senses, - a theme explored in a variety of ways in a number of Poe's works . " Have I not told you that what you call madness is but an overacute­ness of the senses?" asks Poe in another story , The Tell- Ta le Hearl. and it is a question he must have asked himself more than once dur­ing his own tortured life . It was Poe's overacuteness of the imagi na­tion, in fact , that drove him to alco­hol , drugs , and despair . eventually stranding him in a personal hell

trailing him like a demon on a dead­ly assignment. P rice plays the part of Usher with an admirable r('­straint so often missing from his later roles. when he began to car ica­ture hi s own acting style. Elegantly tall and gaunt. with a shock of pre­maturely white ha ir . he looks like a man waging constant war aga inst an agonizing migraine headache. Flo~' d Crosby's i ncredibl~' rich and bea ut i­ful color photography emphas izes P rice's pale. phantom-like charac­ter. and visually the fil m is noth ing short of a masterpiece, capturing the almost too intense vision of

THE HOUSE OF USHER (I he slory)

Philip Winthrop (MARK DAMON) errives unannounced at the House of Usher .to see his fiancee, Madeline (MYRNA FAHEY). That night at dinner, Roderick (V INCENT PRICE), last male in the long line of Ushers, makes it clear that Philip is to leave. Philip's plan to marry Madeline is violently opposed by her hrother who says that Madeline is dying and that they both suffer Irom the strange madness 01 the Usher family which he is ddermined shall die with them. Philip is aware 01 weird crackl ing noises each time the House shudders, Bristol (HARRY ELLERBE), the bu tler , explains it away as a fissure that has been in the wall of the House for years ,

During the next few days mysterious attempts on Philip's life animate the horror o! the House, and when Madel ine takes him to the family crypt. a coffin unexplalnably crashes at their feet. Madeline faints and is carried to her room. ~ter, Ph~lip finds her lying fully dressed across her bed , Apparently dead , she IS placed In her coffin and moved to the chapel where Roderick insists on im· mediate burial.

The next morninr( Philip learns from Bristol that Madeline was subject to cataleptic fils and instantly realizes she has heen buried a live. He confronts Roderick with this truth and Roderick accepts the accusation but explains that it was done for love of his sister and the compelling need to prevent the tainted, evil Usher blood from spreading to other generations. He assures Philip that Madeline is now dead.

That night Philip awakens, griefstricken, and seeks Madeline's coffin. In the crypt he finds bloodstains leading across the Roor to a hidden passageway. Madeline, who has escaped from her coffin , is now completely insane and, possessed of superhuman strength, attacks Philip. He hreaks her r(rasp but she eludes h im and seeks her tormentor, Roderick.

A violent storm shakes the House, causing the fissure to split open. Philip helplessly watches the beamed cei ling fall upon the struggling Madeline and Roderick. Bristol drags Philip to safety and dashes hack into the inferno to perish with the last of the Ushers. In seconds the house disappears in flames 8S its last remnants sink into the tam.

The House of Usher is no more, .. and the place whereon it stood is as if .. . it had never been,

Usher himself, for this is the way we imagine that he must have seen the world - colors ultra-bright, shadows unbearably dark through his oversensitive eyes, through the enemy senses that seek, unwittingly, to destroy him . These elements make Connan's first furtive entry into the strange world of Edgar Ai­Ian Poe a haunting one indeed.

Unfortunately, but not surprising­Iy. there are a large number of de­fects evident in this film . Foremost is the low bud~et Corman had to work with (he was employed by American-International remember) and this studio·d ictated poverty shows its lean fa ce on a number of occasions.

The special effects. particula rly during the climactic scene in which the House of Usher not on Iv falls but burns into the bargain , leave much to be desired . The House itself and

Creepy ca tatonic sonambulist Mad Madeline Usher, stretches

upon her rising from P,er cof"fin. and attacks Roderick. her brother,

the fellow who Ushered her

into her grave.

,

\ ,

\

\

The Monster Times

• • · hr , .In myt oat ... the surrounding scenery contam no suggestion of a 1arg(-:r ,:;,;orld t!xisting around it : in other words . it looks like a movie set. one fairlv faithful to the period being depicted. but the artifice shines through to negative effect. A sense of an outer. "saner" world is important in establishing a contrast between the bizarre death­wish House of Usher and its haunted inhabitants and the overwhelming mundanity of the davli~ht planet in a dark corner of which the House is situated. The acting too (aside . of course. from the inimitable Vincent Price) is very awkward and "sta­gey" and often sounds more like an early rehearsal rather than a final take (though I don ' t know if Ameri­can-International 'is into making such subtle distinctions \. Mark Damon . an innocuous Hollvwood prettyboy. is woefully miscast as the suitor of Usher's younger sister (played by Myrna Fahey. who is no great shakes as an actress herself\, Damon was never dvnamic enough to be either interesting or entertain­ingly terrible and he served as a blandly handsome presence in a number of films more minor than this one (an apprenticeship. by the way, which turned out to be his en­tire career\. Jack Nicholson was doing occasional work for Ameri­can-International at the time and would have been a far better choice for the role . But despite these and other shortcomings. I still think that the House o( Usher was a basicallv honest and at least partially suc­cessful attempt to translate the word images of Poe to the screen . •

Dddl~' enou/!h. Corman' s second effort was a lot less successful and . if the word is appropriate here. a lot less sincere. The Pil .·llId 111i' Pellllll-11/11/ suffered from a severe, even tenninal case of the Schlocks. a common disease afflicting all too man~' of A-I's projects and the fil"" did a great di s~E'rvi('f' ft: Foe. Sorrte of its symptoms included a less restrained perform­ance by Price. an ex­cessive and obsessive devotion to the great God Cliche. poor produc tion values. and a script by Richard

PIT AND THE PENDULUM (the story)

Francis Barnard (JOHN KERR) journeys to Spain to learn more of the death of his only sister, Elizabeth (BARBARA STEELE). He is met at the door of the Castle Medina by Catherine (LAURA ANDERS), sis"'r of Nicholas Medina (VINCENT PRICE).

Nicholas appears and tells Francis that his sister died from a blood d..iaease and leads him to the burial room where the casket is bricked in behind the wall. Francis senses something wrong despite Nicholas' story of devotion to his sister, while Nicholas seems haunted by strange proceed.ings in Eliza­beth's room.

When Dr. Leon (ANTHONY CARBONE) alamily friend and Elizabeth'. physician arrives, Francis questions him, learning that Elizabeth died of fright. Nicholas prolA!sta that he only wanted to spare Francis the det&ila, then shows him the torture chamber where Nichol.a.s' father, Sebastian, prac­ticed the cruelties of the Inquisition. Nicholas tells how Elizabeth seemed fascinated by the place, her mind gradually deteriorating until one night abe was found inside the iron 00% in the chamber, frozen with terror and whisper­in "Sebastian" as she died.

ta"'r, Catherine "'lls Francis 01 Nicholas' childhood. He had been forbid­den to enter the torture chamber, but had crept inside and secretly witneseed the death 01 his mother and uncle, for adul"'ry, .t the hands of bis lather.

That night, the household is awakened by the sound of the harpoicbonl, which only Elizabeth could play. Nicholas is found in the music room., .numb with "'nor, clutching a ring supposedly buried with Elizabeth. Dr. Leon gives him a sedstive and puts him to bed, then explains to Catherine and Francis that Nicholas is obsessed with the idea that Elizabeth has been buried alive, suffering the same fate that befell his mother.

At breakfast, Dr. Leon, Francis and Catherine hear sounds of destruction coming from Elizabeth's room. They hurry upstairs and Nicholas, coming out of his room unlocks the door and oollspses in the shambles they find. Francis finds a passage leading from Nichol .. ' room to Elizabeth's and aocuaes Nicho­las of creating the mysterious occurrences himself. Nicholas is terrified at the idea of having unconsciously done these things, and Leon suggests that the ooly way to settle the matter is to exhume Elizabeth's body. The casket re­veals a tortured corpse- but not that of Elizabeth. Nicholas' mind, at this point, is beginning to snap and he attempts suicide.

That night, Nicholas is awakened by a woman's voice calling his name, and he follows the sound through the secret passage. The voice draws him to the burial room where the real Elizabeth rises from the cuket and ~ him to the torture chamber. Dr. Leon enters and chides ber for not waiting for him. She merely mugha and gloats over what ia revealed to be a joint plot with her lover, Dr. Leon, to drive Nicholas mad and get his money.

Nicholas, now completely insane, ll88umes his father's identity and prooeeda to dispose of his faithless wife and her lover as his father did. In the atrucde, Dr. Leon falls to his death in the pendulum pit. Francis en"'rs the chamber and Nicholas lashes him to the table and seta the ra%ONJharp pendulum in motion. Catherine and the butler, Muimillian (PATRICK YffiSTWOOD), set Francis free just in time, and in a struggle, Nicholaa is puabed into the pit and di ... The evil Elizabeth is left to die, locked in an iron box, unheknowst to the othen.

Matheson (nonnally a competent enough writer but really on the skids here) that elaborated Poe's idea into almost total oblivion, sub­stituting in its place a melodramatic melange of horror movie cliches. Yes , there is a pit and a pendulum in the film (they don 't let you forget it for more than five frames at a stretch) but beyond that any re­semblance to Edgar Allan Poe is purely coincidental.

The pit and the pendulum device is endlessly exploited in a heavy­handed attempt to build up bogus suspense and the whole film is as plodding as the footsteps of the Frankenstein monster himself. Connan's own limits and Grade-B tendencies , backed by A-I's usual niggardly budget , worked together to turn this one into a real hack job. Perfonnances are uninspired , with the notable and unforgettable excep­tion of Barbara Steele (a dark-eyed beauty whose gloomy eroticism con-

tinues to haunt this minor mad­man's dreams, but we won't go into that here). Miss Steele is incapable. I believe (her eyes, her moody smile, her certain way of walking, of talking . . . I luff zo much za beauties from za crypt!) of giving anything but a great perfonnance. Price does a lusty (if that's the eu­phemism I'm groping for ) perfonn­ance, and while John Kerr is not quite as bad as Mark Damon, he can be as boring as the next guy (and you know how boring he can be) . All in all , The Pit And the Pendultinl can best be described as a mistake and I, for one, don't want to pay it any more mind if that, indeed, is what I've been paying it thus far ).

But stay tuned for the next install­ment in this thoroughly absorbing series of articles when we will take a closer look at Premature Burial, Tales of Terror. and The Raven. a trio of more Connan-Poe thrillers" .

Conti nued next issue

page 20 ~,:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: ....

The Monster TI .....

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • ••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• ( 1) MOON ZERO TWO. Bi lled

as the f irst space-western, this Hammer f ilm was li t erall y se lling in 8mm home vers ions before it played theatricall y in most major cit ies. Perhaps Warner Brothers, its d istr ib utor , wanted to chec k audience reaction to such ideas as "showdown in moon cra ter seven ", " head ing 'em off at the comet " , and "riding off into a super nova. " Obviously, with cardboard se tt ings and 3rd ra te special effects, things didn't go over too wel l, not even for the film 's hero James Olson -

who had to wa it for his role in Robert Wi se's ANDROMEDA STRAIN to really appreciate the meaning of the word star . MOON ZERO TWO today sti ll remains unviewed by most fans, perhaps this is most fQr tunate. Thank your lucky "stars" , fan s!

(4) LET'S SCARE JESS ICA T O DEA TH. wou}d have been more aptly tit led LET'S BORE PEOPL E TO. DEATH by its producers, since t hat 's exactly what happened to audiences everywhere who were conned into seeing this picture

,~ . \ lk . t

(2) FROM EAR TO EAR. Film maker Jerry Gross certain ly lives up to his last name in his picture releases, and is here represented by one of his distinctly grosser outings. FROM EAR TO EAR was, we hear, qui te a sensational and provoca t ive picture when released in France under its ori ginal titl e of THE CO US IN S. B u t when Gross' Cinemation Indu st ries were fina ll y f i n i sh ed re -e d i t ing, re-scoring, re- ti tl ing, and re-du bbing - the end product could have been mo re

through an effective but grossly misleading ad campaign. Expired audiences' ca rcasses were carted from theatres surreptitiously by

ing men in dead of night & sold medical schools. If anyone you ow di sappeared during this

ie 's run in your ne ighborhood , ify the Missi ng Person 's Bureau

med ia tely! Hoping to latch on to t he crest of

the low budget cult fil ms li ke CARNIVAL OF SOULS or NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, the men b ehind Jessica's skirts ju st intertw ined the plot lines of the two aforementioned pictures, hired a host of unkAown actors, and placed them in the standard locales and sit uat io n. Result: an unredeemable bomb with the utter lack of any talent or imagination sticking out like the proverbial sore thum b . .

tastefully served up by the mad butcher of Market Street.

It's plain to even the most rank f il m viewer that FROM EAR TO EA R is noth ing but a pastiche of th is and that pu t together by a madman on some dank and rainy inebria ted afternoon. We can just sit back and pray tha t Gross never acquires rights to something like THE W IZA RD OF OZ; the publici ty campa ign for that fli ck would no doubt boggle the mind.

( 5 ) NIGHT O F D A RK SHADOWS. What happened when MGM found out their lowest budgeted f ilm o f 1970, HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS, became their bigg es t money -making hit in drive-ins across the nation? Well the

(3) GAS-S-S-S-S. Luckily Roger Corman 's film GAS fai led to play extensively in the New York metropolitan area, but reports from other correspondents say t hat most of the nati on wasn 't so lucky, w ith some areas having to sit t hrough this f il m on a tru ly horri fy ing first run basis.

Producer Corman cer tainly must have beaten his three day record for

J! shoot ing a film (i .e. T HE LITTLE SHOP OF HO RRO RS) when he churned out th is ridi culous Teenage Take-over film which supposed ly dea ls w ith the search for peace in a wa r torn land. You see, a mysterious vapor is set loose ki lling all peop le over twenty five years of age, with the teenyboppers then running around in their new world wi th every trait they hated about the departed adu lts.

Not even the cameo appearance by God could save th is trite piece from being any thing but tasteless drivel. Corman, creator of the great Poe masterpieces, must have really been GASSSSSSED !

cry came shrieking down from the top brass, "Let 's do it again, but this time let 's cut corners and see how much more bread we can put in our poc kets." And that's just the way this second Dan Curt iss ci nema ou tin g appear: cheap and unconvincing in every aspect. Gone is Jonat,han Frid, gone is any h int at the vam pi re legend, gone is any horror and suspense, and, thusly, gone is the aud ience.

Dark Shadows' alumni David Selby and Lara Parker came across on the big sc reen much as they did on the small one - with all the hammy histrionics you might expect on amateur night at the graveyard. Th is, coupled with poor sett ings, hackneyed script, and abominable sound and lighting made N IGHT OF DARK SHADOWS one of the most litera l "horror" films of '71.

The Mon ..... nme.

DIN OSAURS THE EARTH. The

preceding year, 1970, was certainly the season for pre-histori c fantasies, and England's Hammer Films was no doubt the chief purveyor of such seemingly meager motion picture fare. Their first effort , WHEN · DINOSAURS RULED THE EARTH, basically followed the same pattern as their '65 "classic " ONE MILLION YEARS B.C. -although they deleted the two main ingredients of the first: the writhing of Raquel Welch and the workmanship of special effects wizard Ray Harryhausen.

DINOSAURS star Victoria Vetri was del ightful to look at, yet she

(8) THE RETURN OF COUNT YORGA.Ye Gods, Christopher L ee imitator Robert Quary is back again without any exp lanation for his death in the first film; and once more he's saying almost the same lines and killing off the same victims he put the bite on f irst time around.

Now I realize COUNT YORGA, V AMP I RE was American-I nter­national's biggest success of 1970, and I don't blame them a bit for setting up a quick sequel; but I do

just couldn't reach the heights attained by Miss Welch - even with her beautifully wired push-up halter.

And although DINOSAURS animators Jim Danforth and David Allen are competent in their animated model work, they st ill have yet to ach ieve the masterwork of artist Ray Harryhausen, who ability to bring humanized life to his creations is as unequaled as it is uncanny_

WHEN DINOSAURS RULED THE EARTH became so much of nothing after a short time, even though they obviously tried for at least a half-hearted imitation.

take arms when they just re-shoot the same scrip t wi th the same actors - and then have the utter nerve to rei ease the two on a double bill. The first one was bad enough, and then to have to sit through the same mediocrity 'once again is almost too much for any one reviewer to take sitting down .

Actually, they were going to call it THE REPLAY OF COUNT YORGA, but felt this just might strain audience reaction to the final limit.

(7) But if you th ought INOSAURS was ba d, i ts Ilow-up, CREATURES THE

WORLD FORGOT, quickly pales in

(9) THE MEPHISTO WALTZ. No doubt one of the slickest and most lavi sh ly produced horror films of 1971, this picture had all the originality of a xerox machine,

coupled with of suspense

commercial.

the a

tantamount toothpaste

Everybody else is following some leader's trend, and in th is case it was 20th Century Fox hopin" for a quick victory and coup ovu the success of William Castle's "arl ier ROSEMARY'S BABY for Paramount. The forme , was successful because of three :noin reasons : the acting talent, t he fine plotting, and Roman po l ,,,,ski 's direction. MEPHISTO W· I_TZ failed because it just lacked a"'y of the fine attributes of the PrJianski effort.

Of cou rse we get the we i rd music, maniacal settings, ar:, J even

the devil himself in WALTZ., but even Satan, with ali his pOWe', had to falter when confronted with such bumbling direction and editing. Only Peyton Place beauty Barbara Parkins served as eye-ball .rel ief for bored and angered viewers.

21 .

It's obvious these cave-man outings are one of the best studio invest ments around for Continental production companIes. They 're inexpensive to shoot. with no sets, no costumes, and not even dialogue to worry about. But does Hammer really sincerely believe that American audiences are going to sit still m'uch longer for these sandstone soap-operas. From the box-office receipts, it would seem the only people seeing these films are the sex fiends among us who enjoy the abundances of flesh usually offered up by the latest new budding Hammer starlet that these flicks endeavor to showcase.

In this case, it is Swedish bombshell Julie Ege, who does a goodly share of bouncing and

writhing - but this time without any form of stOI-' nlotion animation monster-izing to back it up. If you must see it, make sure you see the R-rated version; there's a milder GP cut version gO\l1g around which is completely worthless.

(10) Last and least among the ten worst could be a film that even sounds bad when you say the tille, GUESS WHAT HAPPENED TO COUNT DRACULA.

Made on what seems like a twenty dollar budget, the film in actuality was made over three times on the same set - once with the

actors wearing clothes under the original t itle, then again in the buff as DOES DRACULA REALLY SUCK?, and once more as a really degenerate romp en til ! 'd DOES DRACULA REALLY . .. !

And no matter what wa)' you see it, it still lacks any. sort of taste or talent - although the clothed version is said to be the most boring of the three versions, !!ven with its scant eighty minute running time.

DISHONOMalE NEAR MISSES! And that sort of wraps up the

ten worst of '71, although there are 10 others that could have easily made the list - pictures such as HORROR OF FRANKENSTEIN, CAT O'NINE TAILS, THE INCREDIBLE TWO HEADED TRANSPLANT, THE VELVET VAMPIRE, BRAIN OF BLOOD, BEAST OF THE YELLOW NIGHT, CREATURE WITH THE BLUE HAND, FRANKENSTEIN ON

• £2

CAMPUS, THE BEGUILED, and the ever popular epic adventure serio-comedy SIMON, KING OF THE WITCHES! Simon, the Witch-King made his home in a Los Angeles sewer. Supposedly, this was to make him a pitiable, sympathetic character. We agree, living in a L.A. sewer must have been a plight. with no one to tal k to but the producers and writers of the afore-mentioned films! JW.

•

page 22

SESAME SCREECH

Dear Monster Times, ( would like to read more about:

Atack of the Crab Monsters, Brid e of Frankl.! nstein , Castle of Terror, Doctor Jek.yell as Mr. Hide, Fire Maidens of Outef Space, Godzilla, House on Haunted Hill, I Was a Teenage Werewolf, Journey To The Center Of The Earth, King Kong, Lost Continent, Murders in the Rue Morge, Night of the Living Dead - Night Gallery, Phantom of the Opera, Return of Count Varga, Slaughter of the Vampires, Thirteen Ghosts, Unknown Island , Vampire Lovers, War of the Colossal Beast, Doctor "X", and Black Zoo.

I can not find movies for the letters E. 0, a, & Y. But I found the rest of the letters. The first issue was good but I am not that interested in STAR TREK. But I still liked it. I hope you can make something out of some of my requests. They are pretty good.

Sincerely . Michael Thompson

We'll see what v can do, Mike. Also we'll see if we can unearth something on " Earth \ 'S. the Flying Saucers", "The Outer limits", "Oueen of Outer Space", and maybe even, " Yog, Monster from Space", Well, maybe we'U skip Yog, which was a real Yecch !

-WORDS FROM WEIRD. WOEBEGONE W. VA.

Dear Sir, The first issue of THE MONSTER

TIMES was a very pleasant surprise, The cover was nice hut I liked the centerfold quite a bit more , The articles I liked hest were "The Men Who Saved KING KONG", the illustrated version of NOSFERATU, The Monster Morket (great idea!), Books. ''The Monstt:r Times Teletype", and The Old Abandoned Warehouse. The articles I enjoyed least were "The Collected Works of BUCK ROGERS" ( I know it was a review but I just don't like BUCK ROGERS). and "THINGS TO COME".

1 wish very much that you have lots of photos and articles on Hammer Films, Peter Cushing and especially on Chris­topher Lee. These arc my favorite sub­jects in the monster and terror business.

I also want to see some reviews on some fanzines (has something happened to George? , I haven't been getting my issues as of lately) and more work from your contributing artists. Try to print as much info as you can on the upcoming films bec~use that is something that really

interests me. Best of luck on upcoming issues. Many thanks!

Respectively yours, Mike Phillips Tornado, WV

"George" may possibly be doing some fanzine reviews for THE MONSTER TIMES. As to their circulation problems, that's not yet our department. If you want an answer to your question, let GEORGE do it!

MT : FRIEND OF FANDOM

Dear Peoples, I want to wi£h you all the luck in the

world with your innovative , new publica­tion. It '~ about time so meone came out with a national magazine that recognizC's fandom ( I n my C3\e. it's comics.) and the ideas and Ideals of Its members.

Pax , Duffy Vohland Clark sburg, Indiana

Well, Duffy, it seems these days that every new talent in writing and comic art grew from fan-dom. Perhaps you, too , may contribute to THE MONSTER TIMES. -MONSTERS. NO! M T YES!

Dear Sirs: I'm not really a monster fan but your

new paper sounds like it would be interesting even to a non-monster fan.

Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, Prince Valiant, Tarzan, Doc Savage

Mo nstcrs'! Yeah, I realize thcy each met their monsters! Sounds very good and si nce 1 am especially a Tarzan fan, I'm interested in what happens at NatIOnal with the new Tarzan comic line . Ami I hear Doc Savage will be out from Marvel. Now if someone would get Flash Gordon back on the market . . .

John Rose La Crosse, Texas

We've got an interview with George (the time machinel Pal coming up soon. He talks about his new plans 10 film the " Ooc Sange" books. Walch for it!

-SO YOU DIG GODZILLA ?

Dear Sirs, I've been aski ng many magazine com­

panies to print reports, photos and posters of "GODZILLA" and some of his grea t movies. I'd like to see "GOD­ZILLA" destroy AND wreck and de­molish KONG! So please print it in , I think you will, because you asked us to encourage you. I hope to see some reports and scenes and posters in your next issue.

Sincerely, Bruno Dc Bucris

OK. Bruno. GOD ZILLA ya wants, GODZILLA ya gets ... in a couple of mOre issues. We're planning a gigantic Japanese Monsler Film issue "ery soon, anyway, and have access to the original GODZILLA lobby cards. Sooo ...

A BLESSING IN GRAVE DISGUISE

Dear Sirs: The Monster Times really promises to

be a high quality publication . The issue you devoted to STAR TREK was really done well. It showed the thing that many fantasy and Sci-fi publications leave out. What I mean is it showed some love for the subject. Are you going to do an article on the STAR TREK convention?

MT AND THE COMPETITION

Dear Sirs, Good Luck with "The Monster

Times". It looks best pro-monster mag in years. "Famous Monsters" is all reprints and "Castle of Frankenstein" has dropped- in quality sharply after No. 13 issue anti gone down hill ever since. I hope to see ''The Monster Times" (hope, hope) continue for many years.

Best, Bob Martin

We hope so, too. Bob (hope! hope!) . -A HASTINGS MISJUDGEMENT

Dear Sirs: In regard 10 your issue "Volume 1 No.

2", the feature on page 12. "TV Space· men of the 50's", your research is sloppy.

Video Hastings, not

Hayes, and at the present time he is a permanent character named "Dr. Bob" on the soap o pera "As The World Turns" . His brother, Boh Hastings , is the sidekick to E. Borgnine. Also, although the special effects in Capt. Video could have an unintentionally comic aspect, neither character was so del iberately conceived Enjoyed your issue about Star Trek - Is your "Dean Alphesus Latimer" the D.A. Latimer of "X" fame?

Also, the strip on page I 0 , is whoever drew that the same guy who used to do a comic called "Bobly Benson and the B-Bar B Boys" and assorted others in the­late 40's or early 50's?

C. Blomquist

Yes, we 200fed. Yes, it is "The Latimer." Sorry , we don't know if there even WAS a comic called "Bobby Benson and the B-Bar-B Boys." You say there was. Guess there was,

Th. Monst.r Times

Dr~wing by ""'C Bilgrey

The convention was one of the greatest I've ever been to. Also in this letter is included some artwork I did. Maybe there's room sOOlt!wherc. In closing "L1VE LONG AND PROSPER".

MARC BILGREY New York , N.Y.

Don ' t ever say that to a Zombie! An arlicie on the STAR-TREK-CON is in issue No. 5.

WHERE BE THE FAN CLUB?

Dear MonslerTimes: I am quite pleased with your news­

paper. Except that I think you should make it a bit longer.

I n your first issue you mentioned about " Fan Club Info" where you mentioned the idea of Buttons. Well I would like to know where I can get them.

Good luck with your newspaper.

~ ~::::"~;",m .. ~ Merrick, Long Island

Just keep reading THE MONSTER TIMES. Steve. and you'll learn more about our fan club, soon enough.

-HE WAITS IMPATIENTLY

Dear MONSTER TIMES , I think THE MONSTER TIMES is

great! The special STAR TREK issue was fascinating. WiJliam Shatner has a good many of th e characteristics of the series' Captain Kirk . Your first issue was great also. I ca n't wait to find OU I some more about the production of KING KONG!

In the STAR TREK issue you asked . for opinions from your readers. Well , I wish you would dedic~te an issue to vampires and wercwolvc'\ ~Ione. Maybe you could, in detail, follow along a plot for a movie. THI, RETURN OF COUNT VaRGA for instance. Then maybe you ~ould do an issue all about dinosaur movies. Well anyway, loved your first two issues and I'm waiting impatiently for the third on Giani Insects!

Ron Dionne L.I.. N.Y.

We've gol a Prehislorie Issue and a Hammer Issue in the works, Ron. Just hold your brealh!

Send us so many letters, postcards, boosts, detractions, bomb threats, etc., that the Post Office will have to deliver our mail wit h a bu IIdozer. Add ress all correspondence to: THE MONSTER TIMES, Box 595, Old Chelsea Station. N.Y .. 10011

The Mons .... Times

•

B,re""K' ","" .,," ,,,,, ineptness and red tape has hit almost everything these days -from paying your taxes, to bringing that pair of red flannel underwear you got for Christmas back to Macy 's return coOnter.

And now after a long time without any of this bumbling or harassment, bureaucracy has come to monster filmdom , in the form of a lawsui t - a legal matter that may prevent movie goers from seeing what could be the horror classic of the decade.

It all started about two years ago when England's Tigon Studios producer Harry Allan Towers (THE CRIMSON CULT) commissioned Italian director Jess Franco to film the definitive version of Bram Stoker's famous novel DRACULA, to be issued by the now defunct Commonwealth United Releasing Company.

Franco and Towers brought together such international stars as Herbert Lom, Soledad Miranda, Klaus Kinsky, and the inimitable Christopher Lee to portray Dracula. Using original Balkan settings and locations, the film company set many of their interiors in the original castles and courtyards that still stand today - places that like certain courts of law - still yet may be haunted by ghosts and demons from the past.

I was lucky enough to see this film, entitled THE NIGHTS OF DRACULA (LA NUITS DE DRACULA), over the past summer while on vacation in Paris, where it played to packed houses along the Champs-Elysees; the French capitol's equivalelJt to our. own 42nd Street.

~.:.::. -.----

The last place you'd expect to see anemic nemesis of all red·blooded Americans, would be a court of law, yet, that's just where you'll find the old Count lying around, these days. Instead of Transylvanian sod, it's bureaucratic red-tape which hides him from the light of day, as the most authentic and horrifying version of Bram Stoker's "Dracula" ever filmed is kept there, hidden from the eyes of the American monster-loving public. Let's let MONSTER TIMES contributing editor, Jim Wnoroski shovel all the graveyard dirt about what's been happening as ...

by JIM WNOROSKI

The picture cou ld aptly be labeled a masterp iece of atmospheric horror. Director Franco sticks closely to the Stoker novel for the first half of th~ film, bringing to life on the screen all the I iv id and almost indescribably feelings of terror - right down to the serviant wolves baying to the blue lights of the shrouded Transylvanian forest.

Although thf! film bogs down

somewhat in the later scenes, it is hard to shake the unnerving emotions one gets from seeing actual liv ing bats swarming around a misty fog-enshrouded castle that you know is NOT the product of some Hollywood set designer. The sky that's always gray, the .buildings lifeless and lacking luster, and the damp and dripping darkness all seem to encompass and possess every act; maki ng the motion

page 23

picture's dreary yet strangely fascinating subject matter come to total life in the dark theater.

But NIGHTS OF DRACULA (or simply COUNT DRACULA as it is called in Italy) will remain for a long time within the bounds of those two countries where it was co-produced.

Why? you may be askin!! you rsel f.

The answer is not all that simple, but the crux of the matter I ies in American- International buying out Commonwealth United after it folded . Under the contract arrangements, all negatives in Commonwealth's possession were to be turned over to AlP for release in the Continenta l United States; but Commonwealth did not come through wi th everythi ng in their vaults - and among the films withheld for some unexplained reason was (you guessed it) NIGHTS OF DRACULA, along with several other foreign made horror fi lms wi th Christopher Lee, wchasTHEBLOODYJUDGE.

And so as the court room battles rage on ad infin itum and the red tape builds up to the Nth degree, horror enthusiasts sit around depr ived of what is already considered to be a classic by most European fan tasy film aficionados.

The question we raise here is simply this: "Why must the public continually suffer the torrent of grade "z" cinema fare, when such fin e films as THE NIGHTS OF DRACULA are just waiting impatiently in the wings - waiting for the tedious American court procedures to reach a final conclusion? The answer we hope will be forthcoming! A s should be NIGHTS OF DRACULA. •

is our way of getting the Illmt hot-off-the-wire info to you; revitJwS, previews, scoops on , horror films in production, newsworthy monster curiosities, bulletins, and other grues*flashes. There are several contributors to our hodge-podge Teletype page . .. BILL FERET, our man in Show Biz (he's a professional actor, singer, dancer with the impressive resume list of stage, film and TV credits to his name), makes use of his vast professional experiences and leads to Feret-out items of interest to monster fans, and duly report on them in his flashing Walter-Wind-chill manner.

For you old Star-T rekkles, William Shatner is soon to turn up on an episode of ABC-TV's THE S;XTH SENSE, entitled ongmal-ishly DEATH AT THE TOP OF THE STA:RS , .t concerns a man who plays piano masterfull y In a trance· like state, sor t of a sonambuLlberace. It's such a pity that this series, which has vast

potential, is nowhere up to the par It shou ld be. With all that ESP flYing around, you'd think they cou ld see all their failings in advance.

T -V, by the way, is due fo r a fantastic influx of horror and suspense films, ABC's NIGHT·STALKER. had the highest rating of any made-for ·T-V movie yet, in fact they're going to release It as a theatrica l movie. THE SCREAMING WOMAN, also on ABC, as well as CBS's SHE WAITS, also had unusually h igh ratings.

Not to be outdone, NBC is readying a pilot for a prospective series, starring Hugh O'Brian, called PROBE. Something akin 10 a space-age MISSION IMPOS· SIBLE, only with missions more impossible.

The old faithful s are at it again. Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee are winding ,

Peter Cushing Ee-<tyl.

up shooting on HORROR EXPRESS in Madrid, and are going in, together again,

·THE CREEPING FLESH, back home again at Shepperton Studios.

Marl on Branda is starring in a new t heatrical fi lm , THE NIGHTCOMERS, and with a title like that, you m ight think it was about beachcombers who work the evening (graveyard) shi ft . . . it's not. Do you remember that all · time super-duper slalk~r-shocker called THE INNOCENTS, based on Henry James' TURN OF THE SCREW? If you do, then perhaps you recall those dear, dread, awfu l appari­tions, 'Miss Jessel' and 'Peter Quint'. THAT'S what THE NIGHTCOMERS is about!! !

The I ncredible Shnnking Man is return ing , only this time it's a d ifferent fellow, and he's a 'mite' sma ller. Tigon British Film s. IS readying or re lease COLD WAR IN A COUNTRY GARDEN. (the t it les ml s·l ead more and more). d':11 ing with a hero wllo IS If, o f an inch tJ II.

Also f r om Tigon comes DEATHWATCH , starring Ian Bannen, Judy Geeson, and in a guest star role, George Sanders.

Wit h all these GUNKY tit les around, perhaps you sh ied aWJy f rom BLOOD ON SATAN'S CLAW , because it looked .. . gunky? Anyway. hu r ry to see It, before the blood clawts.

A fte r mu c h hassle, and reported negotiat ions time and time again, AlP is fruly going to fi.m H .G . Well s' WHEN THE SLEEPER WAKES . James H . Nicholson Vl i ll produce It independently him sel f. Hooray!

S hirley J "c kson ' s marvel o u sly malognant WE ,.,A VE ALWAYS LIVED IN A CASTLE , will finally be before th e camera s soon. It's about time, t oo. I happened to catch the theatrical version o f It in Washington, D .C . in preview a few years ago . starring Sh irley Knight. It was a remarkab le piece of macabre, but It never did see broadway, because perhaps it resembled THE BAD SEED too mUCh. Much more cou ld have been done with it, and I think the f ilm medium will capture all the nuances a live production couldn't. I t could easily possess all the fr igh t and terror th at Miss Ja ckso n's THE HAUNTING did .

OBITUARY

D ied : EDWIN M. APRILL JR .. February 6, 1972, In an automobile accident . He i., survived by a Wife and two daughters. Those who are involved in comics . science fiction or just p lain nostalgia. on either pro or fan level are grateful to the many contributions to the w hole popular arts community for which Ed Aprill was responsible . He was one of the 'If Sf grea t ' an ·publl shers, printing giant collections o f sturdy paper and slick permanen t paper covers of THE SPIRIT, BUCK ROGERS , JOHNNY COMET IFrazetta 's comic stri pl, as well as h iS speCial regula. publica· tlon . . CARTOON ISTS' SHOWCASE, which reprinted In huge size , old EC horror·sci·fi artist AI Will iamson's cu rrent co m ic strip. SEC RET AGEN T X·9 /CORR IGAN, as well as MODESTY BLAISE , and T ARZAN, among others. H IS pass ing IS mourned by all who knew him .

Wi th the incredible success of "Willard" there seems to be a boom on malicious mammal s. I 've already told you about the sequel "Ben," but soon to be mult iplyi ng the mal ice w ill be RABBITS . It stars Stuart Whitman, Rory Calhoun, and Psy cho·di lectable Janet Leigh . 'Twould be nice if it had an Eastertime

release, don' t you think? PETER RABID? PETER COTTONTAIL GOES APE? · INVASION OF THE BUNNY BEAST ? What with the current m oney-making d egene ra t e hippy "Jeezus-Freek" fad, we wouldn't be surprised i1 the producers of RABBITS try to pick up on tha t fundamentalist of markets by having a crucified Easter Bunny . Anything for the old green kale-stuff . Lettuce pray!

I'm sure all o f my fr iends (fiends?) in the New York area, are going to run to see the play .SYDNEY AND THE WEREWOLF'S WIDOW , as soon as it opens. It stars Telly Sevalas and Geraldine Page. I t's about . .. the w idow of a werewolf! Rea lly! And the man who wants to marry her, but IS a little worried abou t her two not·so·darting little ch ildren by her .. . er . .. previous . .. husband (?) who ... was a ... werewolf! The k ids are, shall we say , a Little Stra ng e. T he girl IS into Voodoo and things, while the boy bays at the moon.

I ndependent I nternatlona l will be re leasing FRANKENSTEIN 'S BLOODY TERROR , in 3·D . BLOOD OF GHASTLY HORROR . and DRACULA VS . FRANKENSTEIN . I am horribly, and blood ily aghast -Iy . I sn't everyone?

A New York·based firm, Kirt Films, wi ll release CARNIVAL OF BLOOD , and CURSE OF THE HEADLESS HORSEMAN shortly .

The crea tor of the musical hit OLIVER , Lionel Bart , has a mu sical version o f THE HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME in the offing. T he score of QUASI MODO wi ll be released as a two record album prior to the Broadway production, ala the success of J.C. Superduper. I can just hear Quasi

The Monster Times

T he Creators of JESUS CHRIST , SUPERSTAR . T im R ice (lyrics) and A ndrew Lloyd Webber (music) are going to pen a new filmusicalization of PETER PAN . Lionel Jeffries, whom you've seen dozens of times in sci·1i and horror film s, is directing. The "second star to the right" may never be the same, but I trust Mr. Jeffries.

Master musician Richard Rodgers is collaborating on a musical version of ARSENIC AND OLD LACE . The two gen iuses who brought you WEST 51 DE STORY , Jerry Robbins and Leonard Bernstein, are planning a musical version of "The Dybbuk," which deals with demon possession.

As you have seen, both Television and Films are surging with gruesomeness, and don't think it hasn' t crep t into t he

Gwen Verdoh ,"

CHILDREN! CH'lOREN!

theatre world as welt. Gwen Verdon, in her first straight play , ~ the star of a suspen se shocker called CHILDREN, CHILDREN in which she plays a baby-si tter to some " rather nasty " wards.

humm ing . . . "If I were a bell . . . " o r " .. The bells are ringing for me and . . . " and Esmerelda's little ditty to him . . . " There's the kinda walk you walk . . . " . Maybe they could call it ... " The Sound ot Mumb ling ?" (Would someone investing in the show be called an .. . "Hunch" backker ?)

The Monster Times

CON-CAl EN OATE CONVENTIO" lOCATION

MARCH 12, APRIL 9, MAY 14

THE SECONO SUNOAY PHil SEUllNG

2883 W. 12 S'KlYN. N.V. 1122t;

ST ATLER·HIL TON 33rd ST & 7th AVE.

NEW YORK CITY

MARCH 3-5 FRI.. SAT .. SUN .

CANADA CON TOM ROBE V .W.O. INFO. NOT AVA I lABlE

WRITE CONVENTION 594 MARKHAM ST. TORONTO, ONTARIO, CANAOA

L.A. CON MARCH 25-27

FRI.. SAT .. SUN . JERRY O' HARA

14722 LEMOLI AVe. L.A. HILTON.

LOS ANGELES. GAROENIA, CALIF. 92249

MARCH 31, APRIL 1. 2

FRI., SAT., SUN.

LUNA- CON OEVRA LANGSAM

250 CROWN ST.

STATLER-HilTON 33rd ST.& 7th AVE. NEW YORK CITY BK L YN. N. Y . 11225

T he CON·CALENDAR is a s,,-cial exclusive f.,ure of THE MONSTER TIMES. Across this grNt land of ours are quaint and curious ge.herings of quaintly curious zulots. The pthe,ings called "conventiom," and the z .. lots. called .... ns ... deserve the attention of fans and non-fans alike, hence this t,ail ·blazing ruder-service.

To those rucMrs who've never bMn to one of tt- hair-brained affairs, we recomm.,d it_

We're going back to the PLANET OF THE APES for another sequel CONQUEST OF THE PLANET OF THE APES . Roddy McDowell aga in st ars along with Don Murray and Natalie Trundy . Stav away from this one in droves! Yecch!

Scheduled for a Broadway opening on April is a new "Supernatural drama" titled A GHOST STORY . Starring in it are Julie Harris (of the " Haunt ing" fame) and Richard Kiley. It concerns a couple

Oetractors of such evenu put them down by $IIying that they're just a bunch of cartoonists and science fiction writers and comic: book publishers talking, a nd signing autographs fo r fans who, like maniacs, spend sums on out· of-date comics, science fiction pulps, and monster mowie stills. But that's just the reason for going. If you want a couple of glossy pictures of Oracula or King Kong. or • 1943 copy of Airboy Comics (God alone knows why)

who take refuge in an old, decaying Victorian home in New England during a snowstorm. Miss Harris is truly an adept "screamer" and should be really super.

Don't_ expect the film version of CABA RET to be a soft shoe - song and dance t ype of musical . It'll be more like a song-and -dance macabre. Word has it that liza Minelli' s 'Sally Bow les' won 't be quite as goody · two·shoes as depicted on Broa dway and Jo e l Grey ' s characterization of the Emcee will be more tow ards the Satanic figure originally inte nd ed. The atmosp here of the CABARET, Th e K it Kat Club. will be one of goth ic fore bod i ng and dark malignancy, w ith all of i ts biza r re tenants contributing to what I hope will be a truly sinister film .

BroJClway Producer, David Merrick, has finall y turned to films and 15 filming hi s successfu l , sp ine-t ingling drama CHILD'S PLAY . T he ac tio n takes play in an English boys sc hool, with mucho myster ious h ap pe nings, malevolent atm osphere reeking, and y ou thfu l sad ism . With t he Impressive presence of Robert Preston. Beau Bndges and James Mason you can expect a w inner. '

T he musical version of "LOST HORI­ZON " ent itled SHANGRI -LA , didn' t take on Broadway a few years ago. but Ross Hunte r is readyi ng an altogether new multi -m ill ion dollar film version, with mu sic by Burt Bacharach and Hal David . This cou ld be a blockbus!er, and you know Mr. H unter's fi lms are usually Shangri·la·v ish!

DenIse Nichola s, of ROOM 222 is the heroine in the all black modern day ver sion of BLACULA . William Marsha ll noted Shakespearean actor, essays th~ t itle role.

And if it isn't a horror film , it shou ld be, wit h a title like RARE BLUE APES OF CANNIBAL ISLE . IT AIN 'T A MUSI CAL COMEDY!

NECROMANCY will star Orson Welles and Pamela Frank l in. Its or iginal tit le was THE TOY FACTORY, and I can see the reason for the title change . I happen to adore Pam Franklin, too. I wish they'd give her lotsa meaty role s, because I really feel she'll be a super-star someday. Her prev ious roles as wicked children were all

PRICE

51.00 110 A.M. to

4P,M.I

Infor Not Available

Write Con.

Info . Not Available

Write Con.

$5.00 Per Person

COMIC BOOK OEALERS & COLLECTORS

No Special Guests

Comic Books, S.F. Pulps, Nostalgia·oriented.

Comic convention; comic books, strips,

Guest speakers, Cartoonists.

New York 's Biggest Annual Sci-Fi Convention Big-Time Writers Galore!

or if you wish to see classic horror and science fi c tion films, or meet the stars of old time mowie seria ls, or today's top comic book artist and writers- or if you just wan t to meet other monster or comics sc ience fiction freaks , like yourself, and learn you' re not alone in the world , O R if you want to meet the affable demented lunatics who bring o u t THE MONSTER TIMES, go ahead and visit one of those conventions. We dare yal

masterpieces, but she's quite the luscious lady now!

And fr om a new firm called Un iversal Enterta inment Corpora t ion (No relation to Universa l) comes a flood of ev il ep ics .. TARZANA , THE WILO GIRL ,

THE MAD BUTCHER , starring .Victor Buono the baneful babes THE WEREWOLF VS . THE VAMPIRE WOMAN (a gory LOVE STORY ' ) _ . . THE SPECTRE OF EDGAR ALLEN POE . . . LEGACY OF BLOOO . . . BIG

~ (

'\ \~

~

, I l I }

I ,

/ " /

/ \ /

( I

I

25

FOOT ... CURSE OF BIG FOOT ... THE OEVIL , YOU SAY ... and DEATH TRAP . That' s a heap of horror ! Will there be THE TOE OF BIG FOOT. Sounds like a TV series potent ial : STUB THE STARS.

And finally, sc i·fi au thor Karel Capek (WAR OF THE NEWTS) had one of his works turned into an opera entitled THE MAKROPOULOS AFFAIR, which concerns a woman who is 342 years o ld. Wagnerian soprano, Maralin Niska, a sort o f Raquel Welch Valkyrie, gave a stun n ing perform ance in the Los An9~les production, which utilized co lored films, and elaborate set s all of a fantasy dream·like nature. Hopefully, the New York City Opera will be bringing it here too . Write them and demand it. Dig - a horror·science· fiction opera set in t he future with way-out (and occas ional, costumes , .. and sung in ENGLI SH fer a change!

Enough is enough , that's plenty to keep you busy for 2 weeks. Get those postcards and letters rolling into the Metropolitan Opera Company . .. and be sure to mention THE MONSTER TIMES to 'em! I magine a monster opera: GORGO & BESS, or THE MAO BARBER OF TRAN·SEVILLE·ANIA! •

1/, I

, I: I

}

" No·No Monsieur! THIS is ze menu! THAT is the entertainment'"

" ~

" 8

:~ :;; ~ ...

<! III

~ ~

u

From out of the pu lsat ing pages of the late, great EC horror com ix come s a horrif ic new movie.

"IIU.ES HIOr1IHE

(RYPI" Yep, gang! You remember all

those great EC comix of the early 1950's that have been reprinted as paperbacks and even now in hard-cover book form (HOR RO R COMICS OF THE 1950'S)! Well, now five of those great old tales of murder and mutilation and corpses risIng from the grave and demon-haunted catacombs and obstacle courses of walls covered with sharp. new, glisten ing razor blades, and-all-like-that-there! . .. have been turned i nto a feature-length film, starring some biggies in both the horror and the "respectable" acting fields.

Sir Ralph Richardson, of all the "respectable" people you'd least expect to see, plays the Crypt-keeper. Not so much the pungently-punning black-humorist

Sir Ralph Richardson as the Crypt-Keeper.

Crypt-keeper who obnoxiously enhanced ihe pages of the EC comix, but a somber, moody, satanic figure in a monk's robe, broodingly holding inquisition of souls as he sits before a huge skull-shaped altar. But Sir Ralph isn't really so "respectable" - the first film he appeared in was a 1932 shocker, THE GHOUL.

The Crypt-keeper introduces the tales, by questioning each of the main participants in the stories. Then we flash-back to each character's particular doings

I

Peter Cushing as a risen corpse, seeki ng POETIC JUSTICE ...

COM PARI SON TIME : I th ink we'll all agree, class, that Mr. Cushing's modern makeup and performance very nicely emulates EC artist Graham "GhilStly" Ingab' eerie original 1952 version of the same tale: POETIC JUSTICE.

(mainly evil), and we see how "the evi l that men do" not only " lives after them" but often even chases after them from the other side of the grave (or Crypt). A nd among the horrified living and vengeful undead hunters are " respectable" newcomers to horror Joan Collins (M[S. Anthony Newley), Patrick Magee (currently making waves in CLOCKWORK ORANGE and KING LEAR), who puts in a

remarkable performance as a blind man (one wonders if Mr. Magee could do a bad acting job if he TRIED) and Richard Greene. who used to only buckle swashes in TV's ROBIN HOOD.

But even great old horror veteran Peter Cushing does a turn-around in roles. Instead of either the classic monster, leering mad doctor, or the stuffy vampire -stalking police inspector, he plays instead a

The Monster Times page 27

EC writer-artist Johnny Craig's "violent" 1954 comix version of his ANO ALL THROUGH THE HOUSE . •• was far tamer than in the 1972 film. No blood 'n' split brains were shown in the "evil" comic books. Just a healthy old WHOMPI

"Merry Christmas. Luv" deadpanned Joan Collins to hubby Martin Boddey's dead pan.

sympathetic, aging and kind-hearted garbage col lector who repai rs thrown-away toys and gives them to young children. Bet you weren't ready for that! But rest assured, before his segment is over, he takes on a more horri fying demeanor, as his photo reveals.

TALES FROM THE CRYPT is due for a "World Screamiere" on March 7th in New York City (the theater hasn't been announced at presstim e), but the producers heartily advise all potentia l audiences to put themselves into a fine mood for the occasion by "Shrieking their way into the theater," and that " A scream will get them passes into the house".

By the way, if you're really interested in seeing what the original EC com ix stories that are adapted were, getteth thysell to the Society 01 Illustrators Building at 128 East 63rd Street in Manhattan, and drag your eyeball s across the exhibit which begins there on March 6th; they're showing the original comi c book art (monster-sized stuff, each page the better part of a yard highl) of the five stories adapted in TALES FROM THE CRYPT.

But more news for old EC com ix fans, the stories from TALES FROM THE CRYPT, which have already seen comic , and paperback-reprint form, have come to book form; a noveli zation treatment of the stories! So com ix have evolved to prose. It's been shown in various studies (studies which weren't publicized until long after Senator Estes Kefauver and Frederick Wertham and the hypocriti c al Comics Code Authority had successfully , ram-rodded the EC horror and science fiction comics out of business) that the ghouls and

GUN.R LAUGHED TO HIMSELF AS HE ST&AT£O OUT Of HIS CUBICLE •••

GUNNER BEGAN TO RUN. Ht HAl) TO REACH "R[[DON .(fOII( THAT SUINtO OOG CtlV'HT HIli! HE !IAN 00" THE TWISTING MAZE. COftlU­

OO"S ... T'" SOU'" OF TH[ LO'"'' arMING HIIli .

MORE COMPARISON TIME: Nigel Patrick's resemblance to the superintendent of the hOlM

for the blind in the BLIND ALLEY setJTIent, and George Evans' original 1954 interpretation. drawn neeny two decaying decades ago.

murderers and undead and bug-eyed-monsters in the EC stories actually encouraged kids back in the 1950's to deve lop their reading skills, and to discover the many fantastic universes of wonder and horror to be found in prose stories. I t's really ironic that the very comix wh ich certain government officials an d rival publishing companies conspired against to put out of business, should have this double tribute, yea, honor! of both film and prose adaptation. Those who learned to appreciate prose, reading EC comix, can come full circle, reading EC prose.

"

The EC comix frequently ' ran stories of th!) dead having their final ju stice, a ' horrifying vengeance, often a return from the crypt or tomb or burial plot to have the last Ghastly laugh. And Bill Gaines and AI Feldstein (who now put out MAD) can revel in the final gloating glory . .. giggling all the way to the bank. For it seems that TALES FROM THE CRYPT will be a horri fi c hit.

Let's face it; no one's ever going t o make a successful movie about the Comics Code Authority - let alone about the late Senator Estes Kefauver (who him?) _

FULL COLOR POSTERS

POSTERS BY 18.-. , FRANK FRAZmA. < J

For mood and tone and anatomy and stark por· traits of wonder, Frazett. is the master! Each poster

A. WEREWOLF (eo", p.inting lor CREEPY 4).

Silhouetted Igainst an orange moon is the raven· Ing beast of our night· mares, about to pounce on the victim who has un­fortunately discovered him! . $2.50

B. SKIN OlVER (eo ... painting for EERIE 3).

There is the treasure chest, spilling its riches into the ocean depth in which the awed skin·diver has discovered it. But what is that fearful, mono straus thing rearing up behind it? $2.50

C. BRroAK THE BAR BAR· ' IAN VS. THE SORCERESS (cover painting for Paper­back library paperback).

Brak. with sword and on horseback, looks up into murkw skies to see­is it • vision of a woman? 1$ that evil she seems to convey? Or menace $2,50

O. CONAN OF CIMMERIA (cover painting for Lancer p.perback)

Toe to toe, Conan fights

awakens your sense of awe and fascination. The colors and details are re­produced magnilicentl,. Breathtaking to see and

with brute savagery. death D in !Very aile-stroke, against . ~ two frost giants_ The ."..... '\ scene is a blazingly white ~_ .. t

mountain top under an .~... .

dram.. $2.50 /e • ice-bl~e sky! Thorough •. _ . ~ .'

} \ - ~ E. CONAN THE CON· r ",', "-QUEROR (cover painting ~.;,:~ «-for lancer paperback) Uit

Bursting like a fire­storm into the midst of a hellish battle, Conan comes, astride his mad­dened marger, cleaving his bloody way! The Nck­ground is fire and death Ind savagery . $ 2.50 AU FIVE FRAZmA

POSTERS $10.00 (POSTERS ARE MAILED IN STRONG CARDBOARD TUBES)

HERO PULP INDEX. Weinberg & McKinstry, ed, ... $3.5D Where did the Black

THE

HERO PULP INDEX ~

Hood appear before comic books? When did the long and incredibly successful Shadow series begin? How 'ong did Doc Savage run? The pulp magazines with continued adventure hero fubJres are listed in this compact and efficient ref-ereDce book. '---------'

LUGOSI. Alan Barbour, ed_, $4.00

The world's favorite Draculil is seen in a book­ful of photos of Bela Lugosi in his weirdest roles. Softcover twin vol­ume to the Karlotf book. Excellent stills from the great lugosi horror films, and plenty of them . 52-pages.

, III

ffi

111 VIRGI L FINLAY. Donald M, Grant $12.00

BeautifUl hardcover book, limited memorial edition, including a mag­nilicent sampling of the art of this great science­fiction itlustrator. Mostly black-and-white and some outstar:ding color plates. Also contains a full listing 01 Fin lay's work and where to find it, and his biD,

Proves again and again. page after page that Finlay did for horror & sci·fi what Norman Rockwell did for The Sat­urday Evening Post.

THE GREAT COMIC BOOK HEROES. Jules Feiffer $5.00 A frank and nostllgic

backwil rd 10:l ~ at a chi :d· hood of corn I, book read ­ing, An d th.i;~ adventure after (ori.iina l) comic book adventure sn!l\'ling us the complete orl~in stories of Batman, Superman, and {jf!~en LJr,tern, and episode~ in the: careers 01 the Spirit, f!ash, Hawk­man, and more! All in beautiful color! Dynamite!

FANTASTIC. Alan Barbour, ed. $4.00 Boris Karloff was the

magni,icent master of dis­guise and menace. You can see dozens and doz­ens of photographs of his various roles in this 52-page all-photograph soft · cover book. Each photo is full·page size (8t;z I 11) and is clear and vivid. A horror-film filn's prize.

A JOB FOR SUPERMAN. Kirk Alyn $5.00 The fi rst actor ever to

play the part of Superman has written this memoir. It is filled with film -mak­ing stories (how he caught lire while flying), good hu· mar, and many, m3ny photographs. Fun reading, even for non·fi:m fans.

HISTORY OF THE COMICS. Jim Steranko $3.00 There is a series in·

volved here, and this is volume one. You can find few better descriptions of how comic boOks evolved (from newspaper strips and pulp adventure maga· zines), and there are hun­dreds of photos and illustrati ons_ Nifty reading,

ABYSS I. ,.. --I - - --- -..., great art - poster-sized

Apj/SS ~uul;h~~~or cover by the Jones et aI., ed. $2,00 : This deadly magazine .

comic book was the coop­erative effort of Jeff Jones, Mike Kaluta, Bruce Jone~ I ~nd Berni Wrightson. They , experiment with stories of 1 the odd and the macabre, ~ in spidery, Gothic style! Moody and dramatic and high quality.

FRAZmA. Vern Coriell, ed, $2.50 It's Frazetta-need we

say morel

lfTILE NEMO IN SLUM· BERLAND. Winsor McCay $3,00

This softcover, thin book is an amazing look at the art nouveau "psy·

A slim sketchbook which covers some of the finest black and white linework by this super-artist. Frank

chedelic" comic strip art- . Frazetta. Each figure shows worl! of Winsor McCay. detail, mass, strength, and Nemo appeared in the drama. For collectors of earlw 1900's, and is still the best. ..• You must be the best wisual fantasy 18 to buy this volume. ever to appear on a comic State age when placing page! order.

DARK DOMAIN. Gra, Morrow . . $4.00 A sketchbook of I comic

.rt master featuring fan· tasy, science-fiction il'us­trations and visual delights delights such as giris, monsters, swordsmen, and girls! This volume is rec­ommended for serious students of art, iIIustra· tion, science fiction, fan· tasy, swordsmen monsters and of girls-but over .ge 18.

TARZAN ANOTHEVIKINGS. Hal Foster $1.00 Here is one of the

lreatest adventure strips ever lirawn, by the finest artist the comic art world has ever produced! Even before beginning his 33-year Prince Valiant career, Hal Foster did the Sunday ~ages of Tarzan, and this book (so!tcover, life· Magazine-sized) reprints 55 pages ofTarzan's story. Where else can this "lost" work be seen?

.-------,

TARZAN ILLUSTRATED BOOK ONE.

Hal Foster $5.00 The first Tarzan ever to

appear in comics form was a daily strip drawn by Hal Foster with the text of the book printed beneath each panel. Designed to run lor a few weeks, Tar­zan has now been going for forty years, But this book contains the first strips ever drawn, r~­printed in clear lines in a wrap·around softcover book. Good value .

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• • 4 THE OLD ARANDONED W'."EHOUSE P.o. BOI 595, Old Chelsea • • __ .... Station, New York. N.Y. IDOl! •

• The proverbial Old Abandoned Warehouse house Entetprises presents the most AWEful, NOTE: Add 20, postage and handling per • • which you've heard about in SO many comics, AWE·inspiring AWEsome AWEtifacts AWEvail· item for orders totalling less than $20.00. •

• movies and pulp adventure and detective able at AWE·striking AWE·right prices! Indi· Make checks and money orders payable to: • novels is open for business. Abandoned Ware· eate which items you want ABANDONED WAREHOUSE • •

• FRAZmA PAINTINGS _ LUGOSI, $4.00 • $2.50 e.eh or all live for $10.00 ~ JOB FOR SUPERMAN $5.00 NAMt.E ____ _

• _ (A) WEREWOLF _ LITILE NEMO IN SLUMBERLAND $3.00 • • _ (B) SKIN DIVER _ HISTORY OF THE C)MICS $3.00 ADDRESS • • __ (e) BRAK THE BARBARIAN _ TARZAN & THE VIKINGS $7.00 •

• _ _ (D) CONAN CIMMERIAN _ TARZAN ILLUS BOOK 1 $5.00 CITY • • -(E) CONAN CONQUEROR _ FRAZmA FOLIO $2.50 (St.te .ge) • .., ----.All live $10.00 _ VIRGIL FINLAY $12.00 STATt.E ______________ _ • _HERO PULP INOEl( $3.50 •

• ~BYSS #1, $2.00 _ THE GREAT COMIC BOOK HEROS $5.00 AMOUNT ENCLOSED GL- • • -FANTASTIC (KARLOFF), $4.00 _ DARK OOMAIN, $4.00 (State.go) A •

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

THEBHIDEOF FRANKENSTEIN Continued from page 5

Any sane man would, of cou rse, have been scared to death at such a stght in $u.::h surrounding.;;. Praetor ius merely turns quick ly around. eyes the Monster, and observes: "Oh .,. I thought I was (llone!"

Praetorius has "a long talk" with t he v1 onster , a conversation the audience is nm privileged to hear. But it must have ocen a lulu, for b y the time it's over the Mo nster i'i backing Praetor ius to the hUt. He h ad no g reat love fo r H emy rrankenstcin anyway. And he desperately' wanted a friend. Praetoriu'\ offered him a ma te. , . sort of a " friend-a nd-a-half!"

" I have prayed man V

times for God to send me a friend ,"

Prae t orius now pays a visit to Henry , who agai n announces he will h ave nothing to do with th e scheme to crea te a synt he t ic woman (Those were "simpler times") . At this point the M o n ster makes his ent ran ce, and poor H enry almos t dies of shock right there. He is no t moved , howe .... er. and after the novel exper ience of conversing with a Monster he cr ea ted, Hl!nry is left alo ne with the (relatively) huma n Praetor ius.

U nk nown to Henry. the Monster is now implemen ting the fam o us "Plan B"; the old "kidnap the Baroness to force the Baron to make a Bride for the Monster" ploy .

It work s. Henry de .... elops a sudden renewed

interest in life-crea ting experiments when h e learns t h e Mo nste r has his wife as a h ostage. Actually. one gets the impression that old Henry would eventually have given in to Practorius' wishes anyway, for

" I love dead . . . hate living. "

he gets right back into [he swing of things, and seems to be having some fun pooling knowledge with his former instruc to r .

The Monster 'Times

The bra in has been gro wn in a glass bottle from a biological culLurc, by Praelo rius. Now all that 's missi ng i:; the heart. Unkown to Henry, the. "accid ent victim " who supplies th e needed organ is actua lly a murdered fl ower-girl, kil led by one of th e old doctor's a ~s i~t a nt s. He nry is ove rjoyed with the condi t ion of the new heart , and at the appropria te lime he tu rns to Prac lorius and ask.s: "Sha ll we pu t the heart in Now'? "

The mad doc tors ' Jab becomes a beehive of ac t ivity, imag inative go ing~H)Jl<; in an incredib le labo rat or y se lling, a nd the ultimat e reso lution o f the film .

Machines Oash, lightening c rackl es and the shapely you ng bod y t hat has neve r lived twitches and mo ves and becomes " The Bride of Fra nkenstein ." The facial bandages arc removed, and the Bride walk s spast ica lly around the roo m, her head moving sudden ly and q uickly. much like some human b ird .

Then she sees th e ~·I o n ... ter. The poor creature. lln<lblc 10 wai l , has 1u nblcd Into the roOm. Tongue ha ngiJlg to his six -inch shoes, he tri es to make th e Brid e. Alas! The poor wo man, hav ing been brought into the world o nl y a few mjnul cs p reviously, has already grown attached to " papa " Hen ry, and finds [he i\'lo nstcr a horror-faced bcat s ~

All is not wo rking o ut well at <.Ill for the \1 onster.

He pleads. She SCRcAyl S the m o<t

bloodcurdl ing scrc:J1ll ever heard o n film! Even the ,\f o n s l er, for all h is

dull-wittedness, gets the id ea. "She hate me." he mulle rs ...... lik e

o th er.;;. "' Absent-mmdcdly he st<trts w recki ng I he pla ce. As hi.;; ha nd accid entally comes ncar a certain switch, Prac torius }'eHs " T he lever! . . . He'l l blow us all to atoms!" The Mo no;; ter gets an idea. Sin ce the dead are th e o nly o nes who seem to bear hiJ no ill wil l, h e wilt join their ra nks. His hands grips the lever.

"Work .. . finish .. .

then sleep!"

"Sha ll we put the heart in now?"

page 29

B efore he pulls the lever , he looks at his creator and lovingly says "You go . . . yOll Live!" As Practo rius starts to sneak o ut along with lI enry , the Mons ter rajses a n an gry hand aJld shouts "You stay .. w e belo ng dead !" After o ne last tear-fill ed glan ce toward the Brid e, who is still sn arling like a cat a t the Monster, the poor c rCJture pu ll s th e leve r.

Elizabeth, who has escaped from whcrever sh e was bei ng hd d prisoner, runs to join Henry. and Lhl.: two of them flee the laborarory immedia tely before it is destroyed by a series of explosions. It is the cnd of all c:-.:pe rimcnls for Henry . He assures his relig io us-faJ1UllC Wife "Tht!fC, there . .. ies all over' " We hea r chun.:h music swell as they cmbrace in the light of the sell ing sun.

On e p res umes He nry became a missio n<Jry In his larer life, tho ugh we shall never k no w, as the film ends with Ihe LWO yOUJlg people walk ing o ff into the evcnlng terra in.

Examining the Parts of Frankenstein's BRIDE

Thai i ... the story of tht' finished film . But your aut hor h as in his vault o f ci nema lo re t he actual hoo ting sc ript o f BR ID E OF FRANKENSTEIN, and readi.ng it he discovered that there are certain scenes in the film thal were­originaJly planned to happen different! .. The most notewor th y o f these is th e 13-.;1 scene, in w ltich Henry and E lizabe th Frankenstein escape fro m th e ex ploding labora to ry .

There is o ne scene showi ng th e lab exploding. It is a d ist<ln ce~shot , in wh.ich we can Sec the entire se t ... and in a corner of th e se lling, pressed aga inst a wa U, is He nry F rankt:nste in. Bdore Universa l pla n ned to make a seq uel to THE BRID E OF FRA l K ENSTE Il\ usi ng lI e nry ag •. li n , th t.:rc was no need for the you ng doctor to escape unharmed . I I was o rig ina lly planned tha t Ill' wo uld be caught in the explod ing l<Jb and lhat Elizabe th. t ry ing to ge t into the building to .. cc her husband , would a lso be kiUed in the explo sio n.

r If you look closely, the next time you see BRID E OF FRANK ENST EIN, you wi ll see o ld Hcnry Fra nkenstein barely esc<Jping, o nly to die lfl the lab ... and then standing o utside th e lab, watching it (ami him sclf) per ish. This is o nc o f the film 's I wo ACC ID ENTAL f unny mo me nts. The o t he r is Boris Karlofrs walk. which always reminds so me of Fred Gwynne's co mic-mo ns tcr MUNST ER gait - Editor. J

the cast-making Cast Colin Clivc, the yOWlg performer who

pl ayed " He nry Frankenstein ," W:lS

descended of the famou s British Clive family o f Ind ia. He started acting in unjmprcss ivc roles fina lly working his W<JY into the comp<t ny of James Whale's play "J o urney 's End." He was there no tked by direc to r Whale w ho took him under his professiona l bl.l t-Wing. Wh ale knew him to be a sensitive, sometimes broodjng fe llow, and wh en J ames Wilale was chosen to produ ce Frankenstein, he called Cl ive to Hollywood to pl ay Henry in the 193 1 " F ra nkenstein. " WhaJe kept h im in the cast o f the second film . No one el se could have played th e cha racter in the manner that Clive <Jccomplished, for the cha rac ter and th e pe rformer were o ne and the sam e. In fac t, it is possi ble that th e charac te r o f Hen ry wa s writt en a rou nd Clive .

Ernest Thcsige r siarted h is career as a Shakespea r ea n perform er in Grea t Britain. He, too, worked with Whale in o ne of the direc tor's plays, and Whale , h aving a tremendous l,ik ing for eccentric gen iuses, started u sing him in his films. In 1932 Th esiger appeared in THE OLD DA RK HOUSE a< the weird " Horace

30

"The Bude of Frankenstein'"

Femme." Like ··Or. Praetorius" Femme also liked gin.

Thesiger also appeared in Sci-Fi Master H.G.Welis' 2nd great film , THE MAN WHO COULD WORK MIRACLES, as the alcohol-imbibing Reverend Maydig, who was also a bit of a nut. He would have played the nutty artist Theo tocopuloU5 in H.G.Wells' THINGS TO COME, had he not accepted the role of ·'Dr. Praetorius" in BRIDE. I Sec MONSTER TIMES No. I and Ollr magnificent article on THINGS TO COME. - Editorl

As for Boris Karloff , nothing need be said about the career of a genius. Karlaff came from nowhere (the almost total obscurity of Hollywood bit-player) to play the title role of the Monster in Whale's 1931 FRANKENSTEIN. Again, no one but Karloff could have played his role, and so he c ontinued the chara c terization in "The Bride of Frankenstein ...

There were other actors who portrayed the Monster after Karloff left the series in 1939 , but they did not attempt to inject any humanity into the role. They w'ere s imply walking colossus-figures, completely devoid of character, sympathy, or meanjng.

AI;"eady thoroughly established as a performer when "Bride" was being produced , Karloff had filled the vacant spot left by the untimely passing of Lo n Chaney , Sr. in 1930. Bul , as wIth all his roles . Karl o ff essayed his second portrdyal o f th e Monstro us figu re as if his career depended upon it.. He added an element. of sensitivity, penetrating sinceri ty and general class to every fiJm he ever appeared in ..... especially TH E BRIDE OF FRA:-IKENSTEIN.

Piercingly good make up Karloff's makeup was made by the

make-up genius of all time, Jack P .. Pierce, who also designed "The Mummy" and ·"The Wolfman" among others. Having done the inHial job of designing for

FRANKENSTEIN. Pierce altered tho makeup more than slightly for the equal, to fit il .to th :! changes that the Monster had undergon~.

Because of the damage to the creature in the opening scenes of the film, most of the hair was made to seem burned-off the Monster's head. Only short, frizzled ends were left in patches, with the SK ULL of the creatures protruding in most spots .. There were additional facial scars, and the original ones were more pronounced ..

There was additional makeup to indicate that the hands of the Monster had been burned , and that some of the fingers were fused together by the heat of the blaze, The Monster walked with a limp to heighten the effect.

Because he was supposed to appear more human, the makeup on the lower half of KarlofPs face was diminished so as to provide for more facial expression on the part of the performer.

It is unfortunate there were no colOI' stills taken at the time, for the makeup used on Karloff in B RIDE. as was done with his makeup in the original FRANKENSTEIN, which was colored a pale green. The color of Boris' makeup in the seq uel is now lost.

One of the weiIdest makeups ever seen on screen transformed the beautifully delicate features of Elsa Lanchester (Mrs. Charl.es Laughton) into the thrusting, spasllc face o f -'The Bride .. " Scars were added benea th her chin, around her neck and by her cars. Her complexion was tigh rcned to appear death-like, and was offse t by deep ruby-red lips .. Her own hair was ti ed in a bu n, a latex " bald-wig" fi tt ed over it , and the grandmother of all fright -wigs was applied. Fitted with grey st reaks o n either side, the wig did much to further the illusion that The Bride was it c hild o f electricity, synthetically endowed with life. Pierce prophetically made her resemble a cross between Phyllis Diller and an East Village medusa-like hippy.

The music of the film added monstrously to its effect. It was

practically a symphony of evil, composed by Franz Waxman. The Monster had a number of different themes, depending upon the mood of his character in various scenes. A smooth, gliding piece of music accompanies the creature as he strolls through the woods in momentary peace. This changes to a confused melody as the Monster sees his ugly reflection. Desperate music is played as he tries to save a peasant girl who has fallen into the lake .. The desperation of the Monster changes to a stirring march as the villagers band together for their chase.

The march used in "The Bride of Frankenstein " was re-recorded and used as a c:econdary theme for [he- serial "Buck Rog e rs . " and makes app earances throughoul '-Flash ··Flash

The- Monster Times

Gordon's Trip to Mars." The music Waxman wrote to depict the dank, dead atmosphere of the tomb was "used as the theme that accompanied the appearance of the Clay People in "Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars .. " An eerie, slow tune played on an organ, it also served to convey some of the madness that composed the character of Dr. Praetorius.

Unfortunately, the musical score for '"The Bride of Frankenstein" was written too early to be recorded as a commercially-sold soundtrack. No known recordings exist of the complete score without the sound-effects and speech so undtracks added to it. It's a great loss to fan s o f the film , fan s of the Universal cycle o f mons lcr films and to the music world in general.

" Just think , Henry, that beneath these bandages lies an artificially developed human brain ... . each cell, each convolution waiting for life to come."

.," -. '.~' . ~ ... ~ .. : ..

.. ,"::"; ..

The Monster Times .

where was the BRIDE really made?

Th e massive, Go thic se tt ings seen thro ughout "Th e Bride of Frank enstein" did much to further th e fin al image. There were o ld cas tl es. small hut ~ .. musty tombs and du ngeon cells. a beauti ful country lake and waterfall , and a timeless graveyard th at smelled fro m decay even lluough the movie-sc reen. And a ll those sets were designed speciall y fo r the film , and b uilt , b y o n e m a n set-designcr/ art -director Charl e~ D. lIa ll .

A nd , because or Hairs genius at creating ancien t things instantly , the settings did not look as if they had been design ed and built for the fi lm ... they all appeared as if they had heen o ut there for centuries, standing 10 the country decaying in the clements before camera crews decided to use them for locations in THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN.

The man who designed them, Kenneth Strickfaden, more than once escaped electrocution by the gro unding o f his shoes during the course o f produ ctio n .. The machines, incidentally. were actually electrical, giving off very high vo ltages ..

Settings cannot be illogical , but they can be anachronistic . And in THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN they are just that. No year is given during the course of the film, except for Praetorius's observation that a century before his time, he would most assuredly have been burned at the s·ake for sorcery .. This puts the action of the film at approx. 1800, or 1850 the late(jt.. This goes perfectly with the concept of a Barony, the geographical

locatio n of Germany (or o ne o f its sm"Ucr now-d efun ct neighbors such as . say , T rJll sylvania?).

The super t it ions of the time . regarding experimell tat io n upon huma n bodies fo r the purpose o f prolo nging (o r producing) life also fi ts in to th is time schcm~. However. we do have med ical schools. T his aga in would seem to ind ic<:I te 1850 or thereabo uts.

:--J ow we come to the fu n part : the an:J chro nism .. A 1 o ne poi nt d UTl ng the film , Prae tor ius wishes Lo prove tha i Mrs. Fr:J nk cnslein, who has been kidnapped is sti ll a l ive. Pr oducing :I

wa I k i e- t a I k i C-l clepho ne co mbina Lion . Pra eto rius says 10 Henry : -"In a few mo ments she Will speak to you Lhro ugh this elec tri ca l machine. " Ok ay. "0 he didn ' t refe r to it as a teleph o ne. Using this as a base, we enco unt er other referen ces to scientific details that just were not discovered at tlwt lime. lIeart transplants, in stl"Uments for drawing the cosmic-rays o ut o f space (the " cosmic diffuser," as lI~nry refers to it ) are all in evidence ..

We are given these preposterous things, and, put together, they form a merry jumble that is composed o f jagged edges .. But the jagged edges fit together perfectly, to make THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN gel into a firm , finished essay on humanism, inhumanism, reality , fantasy and everything else in - between . THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN is filled with eternal characters and eternal things, and wlll probably outHve all of us transient mortals. •

page 31

THE MONSTER TIMES FAN FAIR is another reader service of MT. Care to buy, sell or trade movie stills, old comics or tapes of old radio programs' Or maybe buy or advertise a fan-produced magazine? An ad costs only 10 cents per word (minimum, 25 words).

Make all checks and money orders payable to THE MONSTER TIMES, and mail your clearly printed or typewritten ad on the coupon below, to, THE MONSTER TIMES, Box 595, Old Chelsea Station, New York, N.Y. 10011. We reserve the right to refuse ads wh>eh would not be deemed appropriate to our publication.

POSTERS. TRIVIA - Send 8¢ stamp for my free li st o f pos-te rs (th ings like Conan by F .. F razetta) and o t her trivia (Sp ac k Ni c k e ls , Paperbacks like B la c kmark, etc . ) t o Emanuel Mavis/3 16 W. 88th St ./New York , N .Y . 10024

Selling Com ic Books, Pulps, Big Little Books, Playboys, Magazines, Movie Merchandise, RadiO Premium s, Toys, Etc. 1900 .. 1972 .. Catalogue 35 cents: Rogofsky . Box 1102, Flushing. N .Y . 11354 .

WRITERS. ARTISTS , CARTOONISTS! THE MONSTER TIMES are worth your time and talent.. We're always peeling our eyes for new contributors .. Send us a letter, specify ing your creative bent, a resume of your wr iting, a few samples of your art (include stamped, addressed envelope) to THE MONSTER TIMES, P.O. Box 595 Old Chelsea Station, New York City, N .Y . 10011

INTERESTED IN THE CREATION OF I MAGINATION FROM PROP AND MODEL MAKING TO FILM MAKING? So Am I.. Write: Richard Van Treuren, VA-176 AQ Shop, F.P.O. New York 09501.

ALGOL, Journal about sCience fiction, featu res columns and articles by L4PO H, White, Benfo rd, Bloch, Anthony, Splnrad , McCaffrey , others. Next issue : Alfred Bester writes about "The Demolished Man," p lus Richard Wil son, Greg Benford, etc.. Art by Jones, Bode , Gilbert .. Fou r issues fo r $ 3.00 fro m Andrew Por ter, Box 417 5 , New Y ork . N.Y. 100 17

Bac k Issues o f TH E MONST ER TIMES cos t $1.00 per .. Send o rd er to: THE MON STER TIM ES. BAC K ISSUES. P.O. Box 595 . O ld Chelsea Sta tio n , New York, N.Y .. , 10011.. Please a llow o ne mon th fo r processing.

Li m I ted edi t io n posters.. Onglnal artwork o f Krogar, Targo r, The O mega Men, Monna the Beau t ifu l, the Blue Archer , The Gargoyle PLUS advance notice o f "Beyond Valuna", the most spectacular com ic ep ic yet. Send $3 .00 for complete poster set to CMA, P.O. Box 435. Smi thtow n. N.Y. 11735.

Comic books, fanzlnes, sti ll !:> , posters, Big .. Li t tie books, dea lers, co llecto rs: and T he Mons ter Times fo lk ! Eve ry " SECO N O SUNDAY '" at the Statter .. Hi lto n, 33rd S t.. & 7th Ave. N.V.C. lOAM to 4PM. AdmiSSio n, $1.00

" H i.. Remember the super-heroes of yesteryear? And how about the old E .C. sc ience fiction & horror stories? Well, I go t um'all on tape! If you'd li ke to trade your 25 year old comics fo r them, write to "Adventure Unlim­ited" , c/ o Jimmy Thornton, Apt.. 11-E, 225 East 99th St., N.Y., N.Y. 10029

Selling original Star Trek painting by Bama . (From Network Promotion; first Star Trek paperback) Best Offer .. Bruce Graham , Road 2 , Upper Black Eddy, Pa. 18972

For Sale: Many diff .. D .. C.'s, Marvel's, etc .. Send 25 cents for price list .. Bernard Zlochowor, 120-16 Darrow Place, Bronx, N .. Y. 10475

Wanted: Old Mad magazines or books in good condition reasonable prices .. . .. Send your own list to Jonathan Seiger 711 Amsterdam Avenue, N .. Y., N .Y. 10025

We will copy your old photographs or stills for you at $2 .. 50 for 5x7 and $2. 75 for 8xl0. Extra prints are $.75 for 5x7 and $1.00 for 8xl0. We can also copy from film and slides_ Other Quality Services at Equally Reasonable Pnces .. Ask about our Quantity Prices. PHOTOGRAPHICS UNLIMITED_ 1149 Broadway, New York, N .. V. 10001. Tel, 212-689-7380

WE'LL THANK YOU IN PRINT! -fo r allOWing us to run some of your rare still s in THE MONSTER TIMES. COLLECTORS, we are on the lookout fo r rare mo nster, hor ror, sci-fi and fantasy still s, pressbooks, lobby cards, posters, and other visual goodies with wh ich to exo tically embellish our artic les. We'll c redit your photos and yo u'lI BECOME FAMOUS! Send checkli sts of your collections to us, P.O. Box 595 Old Chel sea Station, New York City, N.Y. 10011 Include your Add ress and Phone Number .. .. .. Thanx.

FANOOM 'S FAN Z INE - fandom's o nl y combination Newszine/C ontribu .. ti o n publ icat ion . Send subs (4 for $1..)/ & ar tic les to Emanuel Mar is 316 W. 88th St., N .Y. 10024

WANT ED : Old Monster Magazines such as "M o n s ter Mania". Bob Du n can; C .. O 360 3 Indian Road; Toledo . Oh io 43606

WA NTED FOR REVIEW!!! TMT is about to begin it Fan .. Ad-Art .. Zine reviews _ ... start sending them in c/o Z ines, The Mo nster Times, Box 595, Old Chealsa Station. N .Y . 10011

•••••••••••••••••••••••• Enclosed is $ ___ for my _ __ word (minimum 25) classified ad_

NAME _ _______ ADDRESS _______ _

CITY STATE ____ ZIP ___ _

page 32

NEXT ISSUE! CREATURE

RED

T he Creatu re from the Black Lagoon spil l s the beans about his exo ti c life in Holl ywood i n MEM O IRS OF A LAGOON . CREATURE .

THE RETU R N OF D R . X H umphrey B ogar t '<; ONI Y horror him w ill be spo t-ligh ted . We can i u st hear o l d Bogey , now, m u t tenng : "Slay It agai n, Sam!"

M USHROOM MONSTERS pop up on our pages, once agoon. MOl e f or g ettable f il ms fondly rem ember ed by Jeering Joe, the K orroslve Kane .

And a super-spec ial fu ll co lor CREATURE FR OM THE BL AC K LAGOON PO STE R !

THE STAR TRE K C ON REVISITED , IS a specia l page of

memo ri es and m using Inc iden ts at the larges t fan even t of alt time.

A nd rou nd two o f the batt le o f t he centuries ( 19th and 20th ) ; RO GER CO RM AN VS . EDGAR ALLEN POE ! w il l be recou nt ed by raucous refereei ng spi t-fire sports cri t ic, Young M ighty J oe.

N ow i sn't a ll th is wor th sub scr ib i ng to?

The Monster Times

TESTIM ON I AL

"F RIGHT ON! I think a subscrip tion (0 T H E MONSTER T I [\'I £S I ~ Just whal has been missing in my life ! Life d idn'i seem to mea n much to Itte. for a long. dreary t ime. Doldrums had been seuing in . I felt SO rt of. well. you k no w, ho llow. Meaningless . You know. And then I ran into TH E MONSTER TlI'I ES in my ne ighborhood newsstand (I was fl y ing a little low - nearl y broke my wings). Saw TH E MONSTER T IM ES and I w as suddenl y transformed ... hec3me a new perso n . Well , t he sam e o ld pe rson . rea lly, h UI a person . Y OII k Il O\\' hnw il is . some times yo u haven' t even go t the ge t up and go 10 change back in to a human . you kno w. Well , you k no w . Yo u know . Bu t now Ih a t I' ve fou nd T HE MO NST ER TIMES, life is a wonderful new ad vent ure. Like how to IIllkc it to Ihe newss tand in that thin san d wich of lime be tween sundown and the news~ t a nd close·d own. Vou kn ow . It 's reall y a ch allenge . Bu t as the days are gettin g lunger. I won ' t be able to d o il anymo re . Especia lly wilh th at dea thl y Daylig lu Savi ng Ti me ! So now J subscribe . to get TH E MONSTER TIM ES d elivered c\'e ry two weeks. de live red in a plain, bro wn envelope. right to m y coffin·C 1'l>1eu:.4.&z,.4~

C. O rack u leski Brook lyn . New York

With every sub of a year or more, the subscriber gets a free 25· word classified ad, to be run on our Fan·Fair page. You can advertise comics or stills or pulps, etc. or for anything else, provided i t 's in good tastel

------------1 --------. 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

I think THE MONSTER TIMES

is just what I'". been looking for I

E nelostd is S . ... ... .

Make check or money Old« payable to :

THE MONSTE R TIMES,

P.O. Bo)( 59S, Old Chelsea Station,

New York Ci ty, N.Y. 10011

A, a new subscriber (for a sub of one year or more), her. is my 2S·word ad, to appear FREE of ch"98 in Fan·Fair n soon as pouibl • .

1----------------1------------------1----------------1----------------1-----------------

4 1

S 6.00 for 13 issues (6 months)

$10.00 for 26 issues (1 yea r)

$18.00 for 52 issues (2 yea rsl

$12.00 for 26 issues CA N A DA

$18.00 for 26 issues FORE IGN

Name ______________ _

Address ______________ _

City ____________ __

State ________ Zlp, __ _

P$: I pledge by the light 01 the next lu ll moon 10 bolher my local ne ... ·sduler until he (d) shakes In

hiS boots at Ihe sight 01 me. an d (b) regu larly and

prominent ly dlsolays TH E MONSTER TI MES.

1 I I

• I I I I 1 I I 1 I 1 1 .... --------. -.. ---------_ .. PI .... allow. few wMks for yoor subscription to b, procesMd.

DREGS Motto #1

Y"h( k "or .. . finish .. .

then sleep!"