Weird Fantasy #7

Credits:
Cover dated May/June 1951
Cover by Al Feldstein

"7 Year Old Genius!" - Art by Al Feldstein/Story by Al Feldstein & Bill Gaines
"Come Into My Parlor" -  Art by Jack Kamen/Story by Al Feldstein & Bill Gaines
"Across the Sun!" - Art by George Roussos/Story by Al Feldstein & Bill Gaines
"Breakdown!" - Art by Wally Wood/Story by Al Feldstein & Bill Gaines

"7 Year Old Genius!" - Seven year old Rufus is not only a genius, but the smartest being on Earth. He has his parents bring him to the White House to meet the President. He is stopped on the way, but is encountered by the Secretary of Defense. The Secretary of Defense has Rufus prove him genius to himself and many other people and does a background check, finding that Rufus is this way due to his father being exposed to radiation. Rufus is able to create a cure for cancer and other great things, but is pressured to develop a Hydrogen Bomb. He finds based on his study that such a bomb would destroy the Earth, so he refuses to provide it. He is viewed as a traitor as a result, and eventually relents, but gives falsified data. This results in him being discredited. Discovering some EC comics, he feels that only EC can publish his story and meets Bill Gaines and Al Feldstein, who show up at the end of the story. Meanwhile the government has finished the Hydrogen Bomb and plans to test it shortly. This story is okay, but very remiscent of "The Radioactive Child" from Weird Science #16, published about 6 months prior. It features cameos from Bill Gaines and Al Feldstein (who appeared in many early EC stories). It also features a Secretary of Defense character that was a frequently appearing character in many Feldstein-drawn stories.

"Come Into My Parlor" - A man named Stephen Lamb finishes up a report he has written on spiders. Suddenly there is a flash and a beautiful woman appears. Named Wanta, she claims that she comes from 4,000 years in the future. Wanta claims that there are no men in the future and that she and the other women of the future need to serve man. Stephen heads to the future with her where it is seemingly paradise. He can get as much food and drink as he wants and there are beautiful women everywhere. Eventually he gets drunk and Wanta leads him to a room where there is a spitfire grill. Stephen is tied up and put on the grill, as Wanta's civilization wants to literally cook and serve him. Stephen wakes up, with it all being a dream, but Wanta then appears for real. This story is inspired by Damon Knight's short story "To Serve Man" which later got adapted into a very well known Twilight Zone episode. The dream twist at the end seems tacked on, as if they needed an extra page to add to the story.

"Across the Sun!" - Humanity has sent a rocket to Mars, but it has vanished and never returned. A second rocket is set to head out, but minutes before the rocket is to blast off the original rocket returns. The crew from teh original rocket come down and say to not blast off. They tell their story, of how they were captured by a flying saucer and brought to a world that looked identical to our Earth, except that it has 2 moons. There, they meet the alien race that inhabits it. The aliens tell them that their planet is directly across the sun from the Earth such that it can never be seen. They say that they had gone to war with Earth many years ago and destroyed their civilization, which included the destruction of one of the Earth's moons. They tell the men to return to Earth and not head back into sapce or they'll destroy humanity again. Pacing's a bit poor on this story. Things go by very slow for the first 5 pages, then rush to a swift conclusion on the final page with an absurd amount of text in the last few panels.

"Breakdown!" - A woman named Mary comes to the FBI with her husband Donald, who has gone insane. She tells the men from the FBI of how one night at her farm, her brother Larry was visiting and they saw a strange light in the sky. Soon after a strange man named Mr. Trance showed up asking to use the phone. Mr. Trance stays the night, but Mary soon suspects something is wrong with him. Their dog is very scared of Mr. Trance, then soon falls over dead. Mr. Trance also doesn't cast a reflection in the mirror. Larry heads out to find Mr. Trance's broken down car but doesn't find it, only scorched marks in a field. Donald heads upstairs to see Mr. Trance but when he comes downstairs, he has gone crazy. Mr. Trance comes downstairs and explains that he is an alien being using a hypnotic shield. If his hypnotic shield isn't active, such as when he is asleep, his true form appears so horrific that it will cause a person looking at it to go insane. Larry pulls out a gun to shoot Mr. Trance while Mary and Donald flee. Larry kills Mr. Trance, but goes crazy upon seeing his true form. Back in the present, the men at the FBI reveal themselves to be aliens and remove their hypnotic shields, causing Mary to go insane. A fairly good story to wrap things up, the best in the issue. The aliens are pretty horrific looking, even if it is said in the story that they are merely the artist's renditions since their true form would cause the reader to go crazy as well.