Earl Norem Skull

The Skeletal Spotlight shines this time on:
Earl Norem's Skull Art
(Click on image to view large-size!)

Earl Norem, the artist responsible for so many memorable monster and comic book covers, as well card art on the legendary "Mars Attacks!" cards, also lent his considerable talent to the lesser-known "Dinosaurs Attack!" set from Topps that they put out in 1998. The panels picture above are from his art for the graphic novel adaptation of the card story. To find out what's happening in the scene above, and to see more eye-popping Norem art, as well as get the whole story on the unbelievable gory "Dinosaurs Attack!" bubblegum cards, go to my other blog "Monster Memories."

Ray Bradbury's Skeleton

Published in 1994, special issue #1 0f Topps' adaptations of Ray Bradbury stories featured this version of his classic story "Skeleton," about a man who fears those bony horrors to such an extent that he wishes to rid himself of the one hiding inside his own body! Ordinarily this could only be solved by repeated and expensive visits to a psychoanalyst; but unfortunately (for him) he finds someone all too willing to help him achieve his goal...

Well, a little inconvenient, I'll admit... but with a large rolling bucket Clarisse should be able to help him get around. Feeding him, changing his diaper, bathing him... it's all a chore, but she looks at the good side; his not having a backbone means he'll never stand up to her mother again!

The moral: Love your skeleton or you'll lose it's support!

"Death Dives Deep" 3-D comic

The enchanting, dare I say "bewitching" bad-girl art by the late Dave Stevens adorns the cover of the 1985 issue of the "Seduction of the Innocent" comic. All of the stories are reprints from the "Adventures Into Darkness" comics originally published by Standard Comics between 1952 and 1954. The black-and-white art has been given a 3-D treatment that really adds depth to the stories, pardon the pun. The three "D's" in the title "Death Dives Deep," as well as the underwater setting, make it perfect to adapt to this format.

So, dig out those red-and-blue 3-D retro glasses, and really "get into" this simple story of deep sea death. After I did the scans I enhanced the art by adding more contrast, and the 3-D effect in the enlarged image is startlingly deep! The effect of the fish swimming through the skull's eye sockets is particularly neat. Take a deep breath and dive in, cause it's comin' at ya!

Click on the images to view full size.

Okay, as you blink and let your eyes adjust after taking off the dorky-looking glasses, let me know if you want more 3-D pages posted in the near future. A headache is a small price to pay for such coolness, and after all, that's why they made Tylenol!

The image above I clipped from a local TV guide in the year that the first "Treehouse of Terror" episode ran. The annual shows have been traditional viewing for me all through the month of October ever since. At this point I'm up to episode #4. Which one did you last watch? And which is your favorite?

For more art like this, check out my post on artist Den Beauvais over at Monster Memories!

Strange Change model kit ad

The Skeletal Spotlight shines this time on:

The "Strange Change" model kit ads
(Click on images to view full size.)

I've been having a blast going through my collection bookcases lately, mining them for material to post on my blogs, here on Sweet Skulls and Monster Memories. Usually, the only time I would get into them very much was when I was packing them up for a move. That was a killer; if you look at them in this picture, you might never guess that they would fill up ten banana boxes each. That's 30 heavy boxes total. I hope I never have to move them again, but that's hoping for too much, I suppose. Otherwise, I only reached into them occasionally as I was looking for something to read on a bathroom visit that threatened to be of extended length. Under such circumstances, you grab what you can off the top of a stack and hoof it!

Now, though, I am seeing things I haven't seen in years, re-discovering items I had forgotten I had. In many cases it's like seeing a friend you haven't come across in years.

Anyway, these ads for the "Strange Change" model kits from the early 70's were something I had forgotten about completely. It must have been well over 30 years since I saw these ads and thought about them! Or course, I never owned one of the kits; if you've read this blog much you know I kept my collecting to things like books, magazines and comics that could fit flat in a drawer, for easy hiding and quick packing. But that didn't keep me from reading and wishing!

"Ah, excuse me, do you have any toilet paper over there? Hello?"

The Vampire was the one I wanted most; I mean, changing from a "living" vampire to a skeleton, and back, how incredibly cool was that? I thought it was the coolest idea in the whole line of hobby kits put out in the MPC line, including the Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean kits. It was like a scene from a Hammer Dracula movie!

"Goodbye, I'm off to the age of dinosau....Aaaiieee!"

I always thought it was "strange" that the time machine had the monsters appear inside the craft, but I guess they were taking dramatic license, and assumed that we kids would figure it out that it wasn't merely a fatal design flaw by a careless inventor.

"Close it, close it! Gosh, this is my private time, Mom!"

The Mummy was kind of neat, but he only got a little distressed and dishevelled in his change, not that big a difference. I think the Wolfman would have been a better candidate for a dramatic change. But what would they have put him in? A dog kennel?

If they wanted a truly strange change, they could have made one where Frankenstein's monster changes into the Bride! But that would have been a little ahead of it's time.

Of course, the ultimate would have been to make one with Vampirella; where she changes between slightly dressed and completely undressed! Ah, one can dream...

Don't forget to visit my other blog: Monster Memories!

The Living Skeleton

Today's Skeletal Spotlight shines on:
"The Living Skeleton" story

From Gold Key's "Boris Karloff Tales of Mystery" June, 1970.

(Click image to enlarge.)

If I were a betting man, I'd put my money on the night watchman.

Ooooh, spoooooky!

To get the full effect, this is best read with a flashlight, under the covers, when you are 8 years old. Even then, the most you might get is a slight shiver; this is not the scariest thing ever written. But it's supposed to be a true story, which does make it a little creepy. And after all, we both know that kindly, grandfatherly Boris Karloff or Gold Key Comics wouldn't lie to us kids, would they? Would they?

In the inescapable logic of Criswell...

"Can you prove that it didn't happen?"

I didn't think so.

Scream Issue #6 cover

The Skeletal Spotlight shines this time on:

The Scream cover art from issue #6, June 1974
(Click on images to enlarge.)

"Always after me Lucky Skull!"

In this awesomely rendered cover painting, Dr. Frankenstein looks as if he has fared a bit more worse for the wear than his movie counterpart. Based on a publicity photo of Peter Cushing for "Frankenstein Created Woman," pictured below, the cover art was for the story inside titled "2073: The Death of The Monster."

"A hush falls over the crowd as Dr. Frankenstein concentrates on getting the spare he needs to win this bowling tournament."

In preparing this blog entry, I was a bit conflicted... the cover was right for Sweet Skulls, but the story inside was more suited for Monster Memories. So, with true Solomoniacal wisdom, I decided to split the two up, put them on each blog, and cross promote the two. If I weren't so humble, I'd say I was a genius.

Obviously the standards for attractiveness have changed over the years.

The panel above comes from the story inside, a neat little tale of the Monster's ultimate end. Of course, he's been dead "for good" before, so consider it just another chapter in the life and many deaths of the Creature.

To read and enjoy the whole tale, go to the Monster Memories entry on it!

Psycho #12: Welcome To My Asylum!

The Skeletal Spotlight shines this time on:
"Welcome To My Asylum" from Psycho #12, May 1973

So, I was digging through some stacks of magazines in one of my collection bookcases last night, scanning in a whole bunch of new old stuff to use on my various blogs. I put stuff that I'd like to share in three stacks; one for Sweet Skulls, one for Monster Memories, and one for Held Over! Movie Ads. Going through my stuff for this is so much fun; because if I didn't have an excuse to actually sit down and do it, I might not see it for a long time otherwise. I'm rediscovering a lot I had forgotten about, or at least hadn't thought about for ages. So, blogging is a good thing! I hope you are enjoying the results of my collection-sifting as much as I am.

I only have a few issues of Skywald's Psycho, and they're all a lot of fun. Since the criteria for being featured in this blog is to have "skull-terior" motives, or containing at least one or more of the calcified cadaverous creeps, this story qualifies.

Here's a brief (and I do mean brief) little tale from Issue #12 that I bought in spring of 1973... it places you in the role of the first person, taking a tour of an infernally bad asylum. Did I say infernally? Well, I meant nothing by it... nothing at all!

The End.

Betcha didn't see that one coming, did ya? You know, how it turned out that you were the new inmate.. and that you were dead and all... and in hell... yep, a real shocker of an ending. A twist, if you will. Totally unexpected, infernally surprising, even. Um... uh... well, see ya next time! (Hurriedly beats it.)

Eerie Bones

The Skeletal Spotlight shines this time on:

"Eerie Bones" from Tales from the Tomb magazine #2, April 1970
(Click on images to enlarge)

The dialog may be simple, but the underlying meaning is full of layered subtexts.

As covers go, this particular issue of TFTT was pretty tame compared to some of the others, which were literally dripping with grue and violence. I had come into the world of the graphic gore and horror of these mags around 1972 and they blew my little mind. I suspect they blew my mother's mind also because my issue disappeared shortly after I bought it. I didn't start getting them again until years later when I was able to pick up some back issues in comic shops, like this one.

"A woman's place is in the tomb," explains the husband vampire.

Here's a skeletally-oriented story that is fun, and illustrates the level of art and writing that was standard for these mags. Nothing truly spectacular, or deep, but good enough to send chills down the spine of the pre-teen audience that would buy it. The forbidden-fruit attraction made them especially exciting and were ones that you never let your parents find if you could help it.

So summon forth the inner kid again and let him enjoy this while your adult self takes a break.

So it's Snake 1, Skeleton 0 as the fight of the century ends. But the snake's victory was an empty one, since it's bony prey had no meat left to ingest. As for the hero's plan of burying the bones in different locations, I wouldn't count on that working for long. You just can't keep a good giant skeleton down.... especially one so eloquent. Using a combination of mime and subtle inflections, the creature was able to make a simple "Aaaarrrrgggrrrr!" communicate a plethora of emotion and loneliness.

Below are some of the later, more gruesome covers of the type that I was first introduced to. You will not find anything like this on the newstands today. Ah, the good ol' days, when a kid could take some change to the corner store and get some candy, soda and mind-searing images of death, mutilation, torture and terror. Today's coddled, over-protected kids would be traumatized. But we ate it up!

I suppose as long as the violence was monster-on-monster, it was easier to get away with. In reality is just desensitized us to the plight of the abused vampires, werewolves and ghouls.

Okay, it's safe, you can call your adult self back in now, and tell it that those cigarettes will kill them someday. And look out, your boss is headed this way.