Number 644


"Reflection" redux


In April I posted the horror story, "Reflection of Death," from Tales From the Crypt #23, in Pappy's #503. It's one of my favorite EC stories, told in a POV style by Al Feldstein. I think that 1951 story helped set the overall tone for the horror comics that Bill Gaines and Feldstein were trying to do. Some years later, after the Comics Code came about, Gaines started a line of magazines. Feldstein re-wrote the story for Terror Illustrated #2, an attempt to mix EC comics and prose fiction. Except for Mad Gaines flopped in the magazine business.

Feldstein wrote the story under the name, Alfred E. Neuman (yuk, yuk), and used the art talents of George Evans. In my opinion the original incarnation of "Reflection of Death" worked; by the time of this re-working the plot seems predictable and the writing pedestrian. The artwork, however, is a good enough reason to look.