The Haunt of Fear #27

Credits:
Cover dated September/October 1954
Cover by Graham Ingels

"About Face" - Art by Graham Ingels/Story by Carl Wessler
"Game Washed Out" - Art by George Evans/Sftory by Carl Wessler
"The Silent Treatment" - Art by Jack Kamen/Story by Al Feldstein and Bill Gaines
"Swamped - Art by Reed Crandall/Story by Jack Oleck

Today I'll be covering my first EC horror comic on this blog, one of the very last they ever published.

"About Face" - A husband, Jeff, and his wife, Amy, have twins, but Amy will only show him one of them, Penny, demanding he promise not to see the other one, Olga. Years go by and Amy keeps Olga's existence a secret from everyone, not even letting Jeff see her. Amy dies when the twins are 15 years old and Jeff pesters Penny enough that Olga leaves her room and meets him for the first time. Olga has a hideous deformed face and a dour, cruel personality as well. Jeff tries to be a good father to her and takes her out in public, but he denies Olga is his daughter when the neighbors are horrified at her appearance. This causes Olga to flip out and attack a young child. Jeff becomes convinced that Olga is evil and he and Penny will only be happy if he kills her. One night he barges into the twin's room and shoots Olga despite Penny's protests. As she falls to the ground, dead, Jeff realizes the truth, that Olga's face is on the back of Penny's head and that he's murdered her as well. This is a terrific story to start out the issue, with a great twist ending. Olga has one of the scariest appearances of any character to appear in an EC comic. The story does have some non-believable aspects (such as the fact that Penny had to keep the back of her head covered for her entire life, including all time in her father's presense) but the artwork and concept is strong enough to make you not really notice it. This story would be adapted in the final season of the Tales from the Crypt TV show and was probably the best episode of that very lackluster season. Carl Wessler, who wrote this story was the most prolific of several outside writers that joined EC in 1954. Wessler's original version of this story had Olga killed by police rather than her father, thankfully it was changed to the far superior ending in the published version.

"Game Washed Out" - In a Puritan community, a man named John Talbot carries on an affair with a woman named Becky. His wife Priscilla catches him and refuses to let him go so he murders her and weighs her body down in the nearby lake. He later goes to see Becky in broad daylight and is caught by her husband. As punishment, he is sentenced to three duckings in the lake on a stool.  Realizing its the same lake where he put his wife's corpse, he shouts out for them to stop, but his wife's corpse is able to grab ahold of him and cause him to drown. This is an alright story, but the underwater corpse ending is extremely similar to Tales from the Crypt #40's "Pearly to Dead" which was published earlier in the year and also was drawn by Evans. Warren Publishing's Vampirella magazine featured a story with a very similar ending that was probably inspired by this story in issue #28's "The Power and the Gory!".

"The Silent Treatment" - A king enjoys constant music and partying, but when it distracts him enough such that his daughter dies while trying to rescue her cat, he orders it all to cease. He then demands the entire kingdom go silent, starting with anything in the castle, but moving on to the village itself, including even menial tasks, then talking aloud, writing and even breathing. The townfolk, unable to take it anymore storm the castle and sew a metronome clock into his body that will make noise for hours unless he is absolutely still. The king stays as still as he can, but a spider crawls on him. Swiping it away, the metronome starts up again and the king, unable to take it, throws himself off a cliff. The final Grim Fairy Tale, a regular feature that appeared in the 3 horror comics (as well as a single appearance in Panic) that featured EC-style versions of classic fairy tales. This story was an original story rather than being based on something else. I consider it one of the weaker ones.

"Swamped" - This story is told from the perspective of a cabin build over the Okefenokee Swamp. The cabin was built by a ghoul, who specifically constructed it in quicksand. The ghoul frequently captures campers, hunters and other people in the swamp, eats them, then dumps their remains into the quicksand via a trapdoor in the cabin floor. Anyone who tries to go after him drowns in the quicksand. The cabin is disgusted by its creator's actions but can't do anything about it. Eventually, the enormous amount of corpses under the cabin are able to cause it to collapse, and the ghoul becomes just another corpse in the swamp. A very strong effort from Crandall, in one of his more gruesome stories. Jack Davis, who usually did the Crypt Keeper story in the Haunt of Fear is missing for the first time since issue 3. The story is pretty good too, with the unique perspective from which it is told.