Shock Illustrated #2

Credits:
Cover dated Winter 1955
Cover by Ruddy Nappi

"The Lipstick Killer" - Art by Reed Crandall/Story by Daniel Keyes (credited as A.D. Locke)
"My Brother's Keeper" - Art by George Evans/Story by Jack Oleck
"A Question of Time" - Art by Al Williamson/Story by Al Feldstein
"Dead Right" - Art by Graham Ingels/Story by Al Feldstein (credited as Alfred E Neuman)

Shock Illustrated was one of EC's picto-fiction magazines, which were created after the failure of EC's New Direction line. They featured prose stories, with art from EC's regulars. Unfortunately they were not a commercial success and were soon cancelled. With EC's artists not confined to the small size of a comic book panel for their art, the artwork in these issues is some of the best that EC ever published. In addition, some of the issues featured painted covers, the only such ones done for EC. Rudy Nappi's one for this issue is quite a strong one. In regards to Shock Illustrated in particular, it was the first of the picto-fiction magazines, and began very similar in fashion to the Psychoanalysis comic. Starting with the second issue, it became more like Shock SuspenStories the comic, with the occasional psychiatrist-centric story included, such as the opening story in this issue.

"The Lipstick Killer" - A young man named Lennie has killed a woman in her apartment after she caught him going through his dresser drawers, looking for her makeup and lipstick. Lennie regrets his actions and writes on the mirror in her lipstick. Lennie is caught by the police when he escapes and put on trial, where he is called a sex maniac and is disowned by his parents, who tell him he was adopted. In prison, Lennie meets the prison psychiatrist who goes into his psyche and how he would go through other people's things as a child. He recalls his time at the orphanage, and the nurse who he was very fond of until she caught him in her room and was mean to him afterwards. When Lennie attacks the psychiatrist, he is put into solitary confinement which causes him to go crazy. The psychiatrist meets with him one last time and discovers that the beginning of everything was from when he accidently killed his baby sibling with a pair of scissors, mistakening it for a doll. A sort of holdover from the psychiatrist-themed stories that were prevelant in the first issue. Things drag on for a bit midway through, but the story does have an interesting and surprising ending.

"My Brother's Keeper" - This story features a family that lives on a farm away from town, with two adult sons, Walt and Larry. Larry is large in size, but mentally handicapped, and Walt is fiercely protective of him. When they go into town for groceries, the local kids often make fun of Larry and Walt fights them off. Walt is extremely close to Larry and in addition to bringing him into town every once and a while also plays with him in the local graveyard. The locals from town soon come to talk to Walt and Larry's parents about taking away their son to an institution. This greatly upsets Walt who screams at them and threatens them with a pitch fork. Walt soon realizes that even his parents are on the side of the townfolk and greatly fears what will happen to Larry. Another incident soon happens in the town with Walt and Larry, and they flee to the graveyard. There, Walt realizes that Larry will be taken away for sure this time. He decides it would be best if Larry was saved from this fate through death. Walt bashes Larry's head in with a broken gravestone then buries his body. Upon returning home he finds the townfolk there already and is gleeful that they won't be able to do anything to Larry. But it is Walt himself who is taken away and thrown in the institution. It was always him they were after, due to how violent he would get whenever he felt Larry was threatened. The story ends with Walt screaming maniacally in his padded cell. In my eyes this is arguably the single best EC story of all time. An amazing twist ending and tragic story, with Walt killing the one person who was most important to him. It takes some obvious inspirations from the famous book "Of Mice and Men", and there is an obvious nod to the book with the name of Larry (the name and character inspired by "Lennie" from that book). Apparantely Oleck did other versions of this story that appeared in competitor comics like Black Magic, although I've never been able to come across one of the other tellings. George Evans also turns in some strong artwork.

"A Question of Time" - The local sheriff finds a woman named Lila dead. He goes to see her husband Harry, figuring that he did it. The entire town knew about Lila fooling around with other men, but nobody told him about it. They all assumed he'd find out someday and do something about it. Harry refuses to confess, and the sheriff leaves. Later, Lila, who is still alive comes home, and knowing the truth, he kills her. This story is simply a retelling of the story of the same name from Crime SuspenStories #13. A so-so and confusing at times story, and it would have been good if they could have chosen another story to redo.

"Dead Right" - An older man named Carl is good friends with a man named Joseph who they knew from when they were in medical school together. Both bachelors, the two frequently keep themselves company and are the beneficiaries in each other's wills. The two argue over what happens at death, with Joseph thinking that a person's senses still work while Carl disagrees. One night Joseph tells Carl that he has had some money troubles and has poisoned him. Carl collapses, dead, but still has all the senses he would as if he was still alive. He lays there, unable to do a thing as Joseph closes his eyes then proceeds to have his body taken away, embalmed and buried. It is at that moment that Joseph opens up the coffin and admits to Carl that it was all a gag; he didn't poison him but gave him something that would temporarily paralyze him so as to get him to consider his theory. But Carl doesn't come back to consciousness, as he had died for real at the moment Joseph told him that he poisoned him. A fairly good story, that is a retelling of a story done in Tales from the Crypt #37. Unlike the previous story, this one was drawn by a different artist, Graham Ingels (Jack Davis had done the original story). The original version of the story had been adapted in the Tales from the Crypt TV series.