Number 503


My favorite Feldstein


EC Comics led the way for horror comics, and Al Feldstein led the way for EC. I never cared for his science fiction, but for some reason his chunky-funky style of art seemed perfect for horror. Maybe it's because he could draw such ordinary looking folks and such horrific walking corpses. As a writer he was great, taking an idea, writing it directly on the artboards, and having it end up just where it was supposed to. If he stuck to some formulas, well, so be it. Comics weren't considered great literature, and a product had to be turned out consistently.

"Reflection of Death" is my favorite Feldstein horror story. It starts in straight narrative fashion, switches to the main character's point of view, builds to a big shock, back to narrative, then back to the POV. Maybe Feldstein didn't think of it as more than just a routine job, needed to fill eight pages, but seeing it the first time was a revelation for me in the art of comic book storytelling, and gave me an appreciation of Feldstein's stiff figures. Get it? Stiff? Har-har-har.

Because the splash page of my copy of Tales From The Crypt #23, from 1951, has been vandalized by some long ago owner, I've included the black and white splash from the Russ Cochran hardbound EC library. I've also included an ad I tore out of a magazine years ago and placed in that volume.

It shows that someone else also had an appreciation for Feldstein's art.