Tales from the Crypt #32

Credits:
Cover dated October/November 1952
Cover by Jack Davis

"Tain't the Meat... It's the Humanity!" - Art by Jack Davis/Story by Al Feldstein & Bill Gaines
"Roped In!" - Art by George Evans/Story by Al Feldstein & Bill Gaines
"Cutting Cards!" - Art by Fred Peters/Story by Al Feldstein & Bill Gaines
"Squash... Anyone?" - Art by Graham Ingels/Story by Al Feldstein & Bill Gaines

"Tain't the Meat... It's the Humanity!" - A local butcher named Zach Gristle finds his meat in high demand during World War II with the advent of rationing. During the war, red points need to be exchanged for meat, limiting the amount of meat that each customer can buy, as well as Gristle himself. A man named Vandercliff convinces Gristle to sell high quality steaks to him on the black market. This requires Gristle to find substandard meat to sell to his regular customers so as to acquire the red points needed to buy the steak. He descends to horse meat, then stale meat, and finally tainted meat. This makes the townfolks sick and eventually some of them die. Gristle goes to get the money he's saved up so he and his family can go on the run. But when his son dies due to eating the tainted meat at a friend's house, his wife snaps. She kills him, chops his body up then puts it on display at his store. A strong start to what is overall a good issue; this story would end up being used as the title for a recently published book from Fantagraphics publishing various Jack Davis horror stories.

"Roped In" - Donald Morgan, President of a construction company is arrested when concrete at a hospital he was responsible for is found to be substandard, causing many deaths. Morgan is innocent, as his 3 partners were responsible so as to make more money for themselves. Unfortunately for Morgan, they've trapped him in a web of circumstantial evidence by only using substandard material on his jobs. Morgan is found guilty of manslaughter and sent to jail. The other 3 partners go on a plane trip after winning a special job. While flying between two mountains however, they are caught in a gigantic spider web. A giant spider appears which kills the 2 that head outside. The final one locks himself in the plane but goes insane, knowing that he is trapped inside by the spider. An effective story with strong artwork from George Evans. This was Evans' first story for Tales form the Crypt, and one of his earliest stories overall for EC. He was generally given tamer fare, like Jack Kamen, but this story gave him the opportunity to do a monster in the giant spider.

"Cutting Cards!" - Two gamblers, Gus Forney and Lou Crebis hate each other so much that they agree to gamble on each other's lives. They start by drawing a card; he who draws the lowest card dies. They both draw aces and decide to try russian roulette instead, but the bullet is a dud and doesn't go off. They then decide to play chop poker to a finish. The loser of each hand has to lose a limb. They chop each others fingers off as round after round goes by. By the end both are in the hospital, with all their limbs chopped off and are still gambling against each other. Not much of a plot to this story, which is more just a way to show a lot of violence. That said, the story was considered good enough to be adapted into an episode of the Tales from the Crypt TV show. The artist, Fred Peters did only a couple of stories for EC during the new trend (the others appearing around this same time) and was not that good compared to EC's usual artists.

"Squash... Anyone?" - A husband and wife, Milo and Rene, are stars at a circus, using an elephant named Emma which places its foot over Rene during performances. In reality, the two hate each other and Milo is carrying on an affair with a woman named Leeta. Leeta convinces Milo to have Emma step on Rene during a performance, which he does. Emma is considered out of control and is killed. Leeta replaces Rene in the act, with a new elephant. A year passes and the circus comes across the same town. suddenly the decayed corpses of Rene and Emma appear and kill both Milo and Leeta before falling away into a putrid slime. One of EC's better circus-themed stories, with a scary, elephant corpse-filled final page.