Thursday, October 23, 2014
Groovy Age Gold: "Where Monsters Dwell" by Basil Wolverton
Hey, hey, hey, Groove-ophiles! It's been a while since we rapped about Basil Wolverton, hasn't it? Too long, says I! Flipping through the pages of the first issue of Crypt of Shadows (October 1973), lucky Marvellites found "Where Monsters Dwell" sandwiched in between all kinds of groovy, Golden Age gruesomeness! My only question is...howcum they didn't reprint this in...Where Monsters Dwell? Ah well, some questions are gonna haunt us forever--like Wolverton's horrifyingly awesome comic art! Dig the blurb on the first page (probably written by EIC Roy Thomas) connecting Wolverton to the (then) currently trendy Underground Comix movement! Marvel always had their finger on the pulse of fandom, didn't they?
Oh, and for your bibliophiles out there, "Where Monsters Dwell" was first published in Adventures Into Terror #7 (December 1951).
This might be my favorite Basil Wolverton story! Interestingly, he was doing the covers for the rival company's (DC's) PLOP! that same year (1973), a comic book that emulated the early '50s issues of MAD (to which Wolverton had also contributed, notably #11).
ReplyDeleteHe first sprang to national prominence when he won the contest for drawing Lena the Hyena, a previously unseen character in Al Capp's "Li'l Abner" comic strip. Wolverton was also famous for his alliteration in humorous comics stories featuring the Powerhouse Pepper character, and his "Space Hawk" comic strip was also noteworthy. He did some work for Topps (the Ugly Monster Jigsaw Puzzle cards of the '60s come to mind), and he latterly did some harrowing illustrations from the book of REVELATION which Dark Horse reprinted not too many years ago. Interesting fella with an interesting resume'! Yes, one can see that his zany imagination was a direct precursor to the work of Robert Crumb and other underground comix artists of the '60s - '70s.
Regards,
Chris A.
I take it you realize Woolverton's original splash panel for the first page was replaced?
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