Poe 1966, Pt. 2

 (Continued from Poe 1966, Pt. 1)

CREEPY  11
"HOP-FROG!"

The real "golden age" of POE comics continues!

Warren was the small empire of magazine publisher James Warren.  CREEPY was his first all-comics magazine.  Freed from constrictions of the Comics Code due to its B&W magazine format, editor Archie Goodwin managed to recruit the cream of the old EC artists, including Jack Davis, Joe Orlando, Al Williamson, Angelo Torres and Reed Crandall, as well as Gray Morrow and Frank Frazetta.  After doing his final comics story in CREEPY #1, Frazetta switched over to cover paintings, carving an entire new career for himself in the process.

Mixed in with new stories were a nice spattering of adaptations of classic works, among them those of Edgar Allan Poe.  In the late 60s, 6 of these appeared, the first 3 in CREEPY, the other 3 in its brother magazine, EERIE.  I feel safe in saying that despite the high caliber of some of the versions seen before this, these may have to rank among the BEST ever done.

Their 3rd offering...

     "HOP-FROG".

     This was the 3rd comics version of this story, following...
St. John's NIGHTMARE #11 (Feb'54), and in
Dell's Movie Classic of THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH (Aug-Oct'64),
     ...the latter 2 years earlier.

This would be the 3rd & final of Reed Crandall's POE adaptations.

CREEPY  11
cover by FRANK FRAZETTA   (Warren  /  October 1966)

"HOP-FROG!"  /  Version 3
Adaptation by Archie Goodwin  /  Art by REED CRANDALL  /  Page 2

Page 3

Page 4

Page 5

Page 6

Page 7

Page 8

Page 9

And now, the reprints.  Reed Crandall's POE adaptations have probably been reprinted more times than any other.

VAMPUS  4
cover by MARTI RIPOLL
(Ibero Mundial De Ediciones  /  Spain  /  December 1971)

Nordisk Forlag is a publisher based in Norway that reprinted a wide variety of American comics.  SJOKK ("Shock") appears to have been a one-shot 68-pager reprinting stories from various issues of CREEPY, including Goodwin & Crandall's "Hop-Frog".  "Usensurert" means "Uncensored".  The cover by Vicente Segrelles, a reprint from CREEPY #44 (Mar'72), which illustrated a scene from Tom Sutton's "Something To Remember Me By", could easily be illustrating a scene from Roger Corman's "PIT AND THE PENDULUM".

SJOKK  1
cover by VICENTE SEGRELLES   (Nordick Forlag  /  Norway  /  1973)

MACABRE  3
cover by VICENTE SEGRELLES   (Semic Press  /  Netherlands  /  1974)

Warren reprinted the story exactly 9 years after its original appearance, in an ALL-Reed Crandall reprint collection.  In that time, there had not been any other versions done.  I guess it wasn't that popular.  The cover, a paste-up department composite of Crandall art, is a bad idea when it comes to coloring line-art intended for B&W.  I can't believe then-editor Bill DuBay actually let this cover go thru, with Crandall's name MIS-SPELLED.

CREEPY  74
cover by REED CRANDALL   (Warren  /  October 1975)

CREEPY  14
cover by FRANK FRAZETTA   (K.G. Murray  /  Australia  /  June 1976)

A "Vampirella"-like comic from Portugal this story somehow turned up in...

ZAKARELLA  7
cover by ??   (Portugal Press  /  ?? 1976)

Here we have the 1st of 5 reprint collections using the same cover (more or less).  This book collects 15 various Warren POE stories by a variety of artists, from from 1965-1976.

CREEPY RINDE TRIBUTO A EDGAR ALLAN POE
cover by RICHARD CORBEN   (Toutain Editor  /  Spain  /  1980)

Semic Press was at one point the largest comics publisher in Sweden.  Here they did a "CREEPY SPECIAL" that reprinted 15 Warren POE stories from 1965-1976.  Oddly enough, the cover was a reprint of one that had been used by another publisher on an all-Richard Corben collection!

EDGAR ALLAR POE  /  CREEPY SPECIAL
cover by RICHARD CORBEN   (Semic Press  /  The Netherlands  /  1982)

Dark Horse started as a small "independant" comics publisher in the early 80s "direct market" boom, and remains, currently, one of the FEW survivors of that brief, glorious period. In 2008, they began a series of reprints of CREEPY and EERIE, licensed from James Warren, who had gotten back the rights to those series following a lawsuit with Harris Comics, who had earlier acquired them via a bankruptcy auction.  "Hop-Frog!" made its 3rd U.S. appearance in the 3rd collection-- oddly enough, with the SAME cover painting on on the issue it originally appeared in.

CREEPY ARCHIVES Volume 3
cover by FRANK FRAZETTA   (Dark Horse  /  June 2009)

Copyright (C) Warren Publishing.

Scan of CREEPY #11 (1966) from the Heritage Auctions site.
Scans of CREEPY #11 (1966) interiors from the Again With The Comics blog.
     Special thanks to Brian Hughes!
Scan of VAMPUS #4 (1971) from the GCD site.
Scan of SJOKK #1 (1973) from the Heritage Auctions site.
Scan of MACABRE #3 (1974) from the Eboek site.
Scan of CREEPY #74 (1975) from the Heritage Auctions site.
Scan of CREEPY #14 (K.G. Murray  /  1976) from the AusReprints site.
Scan of ZAKARELLA #7 (1976) from the GCD site.
Scan of CREEPY RINDE TRIBUTO A EDGAR ALLAN POE (1980)
     from the Whakoom site.
Scan of CREEPY SPECIAL (1982) from the Catawiki.com site.
Scan of CREEPY ARCHIVES Volume Three (2008) from the GCD site.

Restorations by Henry R. Kujawa

For more:
Read about Edgar Allan Poe at The Poe Museum site.
Read about Edgar Allan Poe at the Biography site.

Read about Reed Crandall at Lambiek Comiclopedia.
Read about Reed Crandall at the Steve Stiles site.
Read about Reed Crandall at the Comic Book Historians site.
Read about Reed Crandall at the Pulp Artists site.
Visit the Vicente Segrelles website.
Read about Richard Corben at the Lambiek Comiclopedia site.
Visit the Corben Studios site.

Read about Hop Frog at the Interesting Literature site.
Read the complete story at the Poe Stories site.
See the HOP FROG Gallery Of Illustrations!

     Comics:
Read the John Prentice HOP FROG adaptation!
Read the Frank Springer HOP FROG adaptation!
Read the Reed Crandall HOP-FROG adaptation!
Read the Reed Crandall HOP-FROG adaptation in SPANISH!
Read the Ignacio Justo HOP FROG adaptation!
     (Coming soon:)
Read the Dino Battaglia HOP-FROG adaptation!

Read the Juan Sarompas HOP-FROG illustrated story!
Read the Daryl & Josef Hutchinson HOP-FROG adaptation!
Read the Eric Stanway HOP-FROG adaptation!
Read the Bill D. Fountain HOP-FROG adaptation!
Read the Horacio Lalia HOP-FROG adaptation!

Read the Lisa K. Weber HOP-FROG illustrated story!
Read the Gris Grimly HOP-FROG illustrated story!
Read the Alberto Vazquez HOP-FROG illustrated story!
Read the Lika K. Weber HOP-FROG adaptation!
Read the Mikel Darnier Tuau HOP-FROG adaptation!

Read the David G. Fores HOP-FROG illustrated story!

     Misc.:
Read the Reed Crandall TELL-TALE HEART adaptation!
Read the Reed Crandall AMONTILLADO adaptation!
Read the Reed Crandall HOP-FROG adaptation!

See the CHRONOLOGICAL list of Edgar Allan Poe stories!
See the ALPHABETICAL list of Edgar Allan Poe stories!

(Continued in Poe 1966, Pt. 3)