Werewolf by Night (1972) #24

Werewolf by Night 24

I’m losing my resolve for Werewolf by Night. I was mostly prepared for Don Perlin—there aren’t any good panels this issue, but there are some where inker Vince Colletta adds so many lines they compensate for whatever was there before. It works with the villain, a Jekyll and Hyde-type scientist who maybe can cure Jack’s monthly visitor. It’s only a few months until sister Lissa turns eighteen and gets the curse, too, presumably.

Lissa has been about to turn eighteen for a dozen issues; I think she was actually closer back around issue ten. Like it was imminent. But nothing’s guaranteed in Werewolf by Night except doing the same thing repeatedly, albeit with some whitewashing.

This issue opens with Jack’s landlady kicking him out. He’s wrecked the apartment three times in superhero fights, and the building owner has had enough. The way the owner’s mysterious makes me wonder if there will be a reveal. Curious enough to stick with the book? To see if Moon Knight owns Jack’s building? No.

But Jack then goes to live with Buck, who’s been up all night replacing the window Wolfman Jack jumped through last issue. Buck’s off the hook for killing the disfigured actor turned spree killer (with Jack whining in his monologue Buck killed him with the bullet meant to kill Wolfman Jack, but to save Jack’s life; no, he never hears himself). Jack lived with Buck in Werewolf by Night #1. Maybe even back in Marvel Spotlight. Three or four regular writers ago. And now we’re back, two dozen issues later.

The problem isn’t even writer Doug Moench doing old arcs on repeat; it’s Moench’s writing itself. He’s exceptionally verbose, which wasn’t terrible when he was doing Jack as pulpy narrator, but he’s just doing Jack as whiny bro. He’s not racist, which is an improvement over a while ago, but it’s a very low bar.

The series only goes another nineteen issues, plus or minus a Giant-Size, but nineteen bad comics is a lot of bad comics. Like, Moench’s worse at naming villains than Gerry Conway. He’s as bad as prequel trilogy George Lucas.

There’s just no point.

Werewolf by Night (1972) #23

Werewolf by Night 23

Reading this issue, I kept having to remind myself writer Doug Moench doesn’t want Jack Russell to sound like a jackass, quite the opposite. Moench writes Jack’s narration as a combination of hard-boiled detective, beatnik, and, I don’t know, Charles Atlas advertisement text. It’s the purest obnoxious surfer bro Jack’s gotten in two dozen plus Werewolf comics, and, wow, does it get old fast.

The last issue ended with Jack under arrest for murder; this issue opens with him fighting the return villain—Atlas (a disfigured movie star out to kill all those who contributed to his accident)—but then flashes back to the cliffhanger resolve. The series’s new useless cop character interrogates Jack, Jack calls Buck for five grand (in seventies Marvel-616, the cops set bail), and then Buck fills Jack in on the villain’s origin.

After countless accessory or inappropriate appearances (with Jack’s seventeen-year-old sister), Buck finally becomes integral to the issue’s plot. He wrote the script for the movie where Atlas got hurt and can narrate the flashback-in-a-flashback to Jack, saving his involvement for the end. I’m not sure why Moench wanted to pace it that way, other than Atlas busting into the apartment like Kool-Aid Man would have an extra jolt.

But it doesn’t.

Neither does Jack’s background transformation to Wolfman Jack.

The fight then catches up to the opening splash page, where the werewolf and Atlas are fighting in front of Grauman's Chinese Theatre. Atlas also kicks the werewolf’s ass, which raises questions about why Jack wants Buck to shoot him with a silver bullet if he can just be beaten to death.

The Don Perlin and Vince Colletta art is just as bewildering as the werewolf rules, with Colletta inking a lot of busy little lines. He’s not adding detail, just noise, and killing any implied movement in the artwork. It’s an ugly comic.

If Jack doesn’t get some humility soon, this book will be even more of a slog than I expected.

Werewolf by Night (1972) #22

Werewolf by Night 22

New writer Doug Moench continues to put his mark (of the Werewolf) on Night.

By soft-booting the thing back to issue three or four. This issue starts with Jack going to see forty or fifty-something best friend Buck Cowan, who’s known Jack’s been a werewolf for a while now, but they never, ever talked about it on page, just went from not knowing to knowing. It’s the full moon, and the regular plan is for Jack to lock himself in Buck’s storage closet.

Jack tried this method last issue, and it’d didn’t work. They think they’ve got it licked this month with iron bars, but the werewolf just… goes through the door. Bet the claws help with it. The werewolf then attacks Buck, meaning Buck’s not as special as the other people the werewolf hasn’t killed because he knows they’re special to Jack. Except then, Jack’s seventeen-year-old sister shows up to see Buck, and the werewolf runs off.

I was getting my hopes up for Moench, and he’s really going back to Buck being a dirty old man.

Cool.

Moench does write excellent Wolfman Jack narration, though he finally breaks it at the end of the issue with Jack—who narrates the werewolf’s adventures in the past tense (meaning it’s already happened, keep that detail in mind)—thinking about how he doesn’t remember anything from the werewolf adventures. All that narrating he’s been doing for twenty issues? Doesn’t remember any of it. So how could he be narrating it during the Wolfman Jack adventures?

It’s tenses. It’s not, I don’t know, Ibsen.

Anyway, the actual story has the werewolf getting into a tussle with a ‘roided out movie star whose former producer got him into a disfiguring accident, so the guy, a former heartthrob, is killing a bunch of Hollywood types.

Who don’t not have it coming.

Moench also brings in a new cop—out for revenge for his missing partner, dirty, murdering cop Lou Hackett; but the new cop doesn’t know Lou was bad. Why get rid of one generic cop to bring in another?

The less said about the Don Perlin and Vince Colletta art, the better. It’s really bad this issue, Perlin’s worst (so far).

Once again, Werewolf’s a slog.

Werewolf by Night (1972) #21

Werewolf by Night 21

Initially, this issue feels like newish writer Doug Moench taking Werewolf out and kicking its tires. He brings back Buck Cowan—who hasn’t been around since he was low-key living with seventeen-year-old Lissa Russell—as Jack’s best friend but only for a couple panels. There’s a lengthy flashback to the destruction of the Darkhold, sadly without the Russell family werewolf curse being Satanic in nature. There’s retconning about Joshua Kane; there’s the neighbor werewolf, Raymond Coker.

Moench—just like previous writer Gary Friedrich—doesn’t write Jack as racist to Black guy Coker, which just draws attention to how much writer-before-Friedrich Marv Wolfman did write Jack as a shitty racist bro.

This issue also finally resolves recurring supporting cast member Lou Hackett’s story arc. Hackett’s the cop investigating the werewolf sightings going on since Marvel started publishing Werewolf by Night, and he’s getting close to figuring out Jack’s deal. Jack living next door to another werewolf has complicated things a little, but not too much.

Then it turns out Hackett’s got some secrets of his own, but before Jack and Raymond can discover them, it’s a full moon.

Only this month, the two brother wolves have a third out to get them. The comic then becomes a fighting chase sequence across the Los Angeles rooftops. Or what penciller Don Perlin thinks are the Los Angeles rooftops; Perlin draws the city like it’s a movie backlot, so there’s no personality to the skyline.

But Moench’s good at writing Wolfman Jack’s narration, and the story’s compelling. Jack and Raymond found out last issue in order to cure lycanthropy, a werewolf needs to kill another werewolf. Good thing there’s a third werewolf out to get them.

Hopefully, their team-up is powerful enough (and fast enough to keep ahead of the cops).

It’s an action issue with a lumpy start and better than I thought possible for Werewolf these days. Perlin and inker Vince Colletta eventually are just drawing three werewolves fighting; one’s brown, one’s blue (supposed to be black), one’s blond. If you can deal with Perlin werewolf, you can deal with three.

Based on where he leaves things, Moench seems to get Werewolf better than previously implied.

I’m finally curious about how this book develops again.

The Legion of Monsters (1975) #1

Legion of Monsters 1

Legion of Monsters opens with a defensive letter from editor Tony Isabella, responding to the Marvel faithful who were mad at the inglorious cancellation of the other black and white magazines. Isabella explains the books weren’t ever losing money; it’s just not in Marvel’s best interest not to make money. If readers really want black-and-white monster magazines, they better buy Legion.

They did not.

Although there’s a subscription form in the issue, Monsters only had this one issue.

And kind of for good reason.

There are four features. One Monster of Frankenstein, one continuation from Dracula Lives, and two original horror stories. All of them are uneven, starting with Doug Moench, Val Mayerik, Pablo Marcos, and Dan Adkins’s Frankenstein story. It’s after the Monster has woken up in the modern age, and he’s wandering around. He sees a princess, and even though he knows it always ends with villagers and pitchforks, he follows her.

Now, if it were just about the Monster following some girl, it’d be tired fast. But the Monster finds himself amid intrigue; it’s a costume party, and the jester tells him someone’s out to kill the princess, will the Monster help? Of course, he will. But will it be helpful help or disastrous?

The art’s sometimes excellent. Mayerik inking himself, Marcos inking Mayerik, it works out. The Adkins inks are wanting. And the story’s really dang long.

But at least it’s not the Secret Origin of Manphibian, the following story. Tony Isabella scripts from a Marv Wolfman plot. Dave Cockrum pencils, Sam Grainger inks. It’s about a Creature from the Black Lagoon type coming up through an oil well and getting in a fight with another monster from the same species, as well as some husband out to kill his wealthy wife. Or something.

It’s tedious. Maybe if the art were more distinct.

Ditto the next story, about kids picking on a former circus “freak” whose only friends are flies. It bleeds empathy, but the story’s way too long, and the art lacks Paul Kitchener pencils, Ralph Reese inks. They also share story credit with scripter Gerry Conway.

Maybe if Marvel wanted more people to be excited about Legion, they should’ve gotten together a better first issue.

The next chapter in Roy Thomas and Dick Giordano’s adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula wraps up the issue. After a lengthy (and welcome) recap of events to date, this installment covers Mina going off to marry Jonathan in Europe while Lucy’s condition worsens in England. There are multiple diary and journal keepers: Mina, Steward, and eventually Lucy.

It sure seems like Lucy has no idea she’s been Dracula’s steady blood bag for months, and, to this point, Mina hasn’t read Jonathan’s diary, even though he wants her to do so. But what Thomas doesn’t fix—and Giordano doesn’t help with—is Dr. Van Helsing, who arrives this issue to commit medical malpractice.

With the timeline visually broken out so nicely, it’s even more apparent than usual Van Helsing messes up with Lucy’s initial diagnosis and then waits too long to tell everyone what they’re dealing with.

Giordano draws Van Helsing like a combination of Santa Claus and a leprechaun.

Otherwise, lots of good art, but Lucy’s the only sympathetic character, with Seward whining almost nonstop about her marrying someone else and Van Helsing blandly kind and incompetent.

There’s one page of single-panel strips from Stuart Schwartzberg. They’re a highlight and shouldn’t be. There’s also another text article recapping monsters in other media, like it’s a real magazine again. Too little, too late.

Is it a bummer Legion didn’t continue? Sure?

But it makes sense why it didn’t.

Werewolf by Night (1972) #20

Werewolf by Night 20

I’m not sure Doug Moench read much Werewolf by Night before writing this issue, which has eighteen-year-old Jack Russell walking around talking like a cheap forties gumshoe. Moench also doesn’t seem to know the bad guys kidnapped his sister because she too has the werewolf curse; when Jack goes to rescue her, the bad guy—Baron Thunder—reveals they just want his werewolf blood to make a super soldier serum.

Pardon the expression but, like, what?

Because Moench’s not lazy. He writes a bunch of narration for Jack. Including the werewolf fighting the bad guy for four or five boring pages. Jack’s got a ring to let him control the werewolf—he grabbed it from a rich guy who offered it to Jack’s landlady as a come-on—so he (and Moench) explain why he’s making all the various wrestling moves as the werewolf.

Thunder’s got a scary house on a haunted hill. It looks like a haunted mansion from a cartoon. It’s absurdly silly; penciller Don Perlin works the fight scenes; he’s interested in the fight scenes. They’re boring and not very good, but he’s engaged. The haunted mansion on a hill? Shockingly bad. Even for Perlin and inker Vince Colletta. This issue reads like the book got told to go cheap on the art, and to compensate, they told Moench he could write 300,000 words.

There’s a little with Jack and his werewolf neighbor, Raymond Coker. The cops have it out for Coker—they just happened to have decided the Black werewolf must be the bad one—but there’s also a third werewolf in the mix now, and it’s got something to do with the magic ring.

Even with the tedious fight scene, this issue does seem like Moench is trying to resolve the loose plot threads. Not sure why he changed old lady hit woman Ma Mayhem into a Marvel seventies blonde, but it’s another change. At first, I thought Topaz was back. Nope. Bummer.

Werewolf’s rarely renamed consistent longer than a few issues, and its best days are long gone.

Will Moench do something interesting with it, or will he too fall victim to the curse of the werewolf (By Night)?

It’s too soon to tell, but it’s not looking great.

Dracula Lives (1973) #12

Dracula Lives 12

No mention of Dracula Lives!’s forthcoming cancellation in the letters page, nor any explanation for the Bram Stoker’s Dracula adaptation skipping a month. Instead, the issue seems committed to origin stories; how Bram Stoker’s Dracula became the Marvel Universe’s Dracula. Or, in the case of Doug Moench’s three-part feature, how Marvel’s Dracula became Bram Stoker’s Dracula became Marvel’s Dracula.

Moench’s story is set in 1597, which is only important compared to Gerry Conway’s set in 1465. Moench’s Dracula is a sad, solitary sort. He hangs out in the castle, writing in his diary, whining about how he can’t find any good human blood these days. The villagers have gotten wise to Dracula being a bloodsucking vampire, though it turns out there’s plenty about vampires they don’t know yet.

While Dracula mopes, a stranger comes to town and offers to ride the village of Dracula for a thousand gold coins. He’s going to wait until Dracula comes to the village to feed, then head up to the castle and try to find some way to kill him. Except on this particular night, Dracula’s really, really pissed the humans are staying inside instead of coming out to be fed on—don’t they know he can’t enter a domicile without an invitation!

They do not, of course, because they don’t even know Dracula’s afraid of the sunlight yet. Or his aversion to crosses. Drac’s got a few surprises up his sleeves for the villagers, not just near the castle but also in a second village where he goes to feed the next night. But the stranger is somehow one step ahead, preparing those villagers for the attack; dejected, Dracula commits to his new role as lord of the undead and gets busy raising an army.

There’s a different artist for each chapter. Sonny Trinidad does the first; he and Moench have done some nice Lives stories. Trinidad’s work is quite nice this issue as well. Yong Montaño does the second part, which features Dracula and the new villagers, but also the first villagers getting too cocky. Montaño’s decent enough, but more on the people than the vampire. He’s got a comedic sensibility, and it doesn’t work here.

The third artist is Steve Gan, and it’s full Gothic horror. Beautiful stuff. However, his Dracula’s not as good as Trinidad’s. You’d think they’d have just ordered everyone to ape Gene Colan at some point.

Moench’s very intentional about Dracula’s character development. At the story’s start, Dracula’s a withdrawn, self-loathing monster. By the end of the story… well, he’s in a different spot. It’s an excellent feature and Moench’s best writing on the series. Does it make up for the missing Dracula adaptation chapter? Sure, fifty years later; at the time, I think I’d have been concerned.

Moench also contributes a text piece about Christopher Lee. It’s long, detailed, and enthusiastic because Moench’s a fan. It’s unclear why, however, since he seems to agree Hammer movies stink and Lee mostly made Hammer movies. The article’s disconcertingly spread throughout the magazine, presumably to make room for more advertisements.

The second story is the Conway one. Set six years after Dracula’s transformation to vampire and over a hundred years before Moench’s, this Dracula still has vampire orgies. He decides to go on a culinary trip and messes with the wrong German, who vows to avenge his sister’s death at Dracula’s hand.

Fang.

Whatever.

So Hans goes to kill Dracula in Transylvania, but times it wrong for vampire-killing success. Still, it’s warm and sunny, and Hans falls for a fetching local girl. Will Hans’s thirst for vengeance ruin their romantic bliss? Will it somehow tie into Tomb of Dracula? Will Conway bull in a china shop his way through the subtleties? Will it even matter?

Just to answer the last—no, it won’t matter, none of it will matter. Tom Sutton does the art, and it’s terrible. The story’s ten pages, and he manages to get worse every page. It’s indescribably bad art and a lousy way to finish an otherwise outstanding issue.

Dracula Lives (1973) #11

Dl11

I had planned on opening bemoaning Dracula Lives only having two issues left just when the series has found itself again, but then I did some research and discovered it’s worse than the series just canceling. They’re not going to finish the Bram Stoker’s Dracula adaptation here; there’s no more Lilith (more on her adventures in a bit). I wish I hadn’t looked ahead. However, if I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have known where to go for the next (and temporarily final) Stoker adaptation entry.

There’s a reason reading monthly comics is a pain in the ass, even fifty years later.

Anyway.

This issue’s great, and I’m super duper sad there are only two more issues.

The magazine aspects of Lives are gone this issue; letters column, but no features—lots of ads. But the stories are all good. The art on the Lilith story’s a disaster, but if Lilith had been well-executed back in the day (writer Steve Gerber’s finding his legs fast), we’d remember it.

We’ll go in reverse order, starting with the Lilith story. It’s a long story, and Bob Brown’s pencils are terrible. They’ve got Frank Chiaramonte inking him, which is a choice, but then Pablo Marcos also has a credit, and even though I’m lukewarm on Marcos (or do I like him, it’s been so long since Lives had top-shelf artists), I was expecting the art to not be terrible.

But it’s terrible. Oddly, Brown’s pencils look like they were meant for digest size, not a magazine page, like seeing them smaller would improve things. Like the frequent lack of faces. Though the story’s all about there not being a face. Lilith’s human half runs afoul of some incel planning to do a mass shooting—no shit, in 1975–and Lilith takes over to stop him. Except there’s only so much she can do. It’s intense.

There’s some character development for Lilith and her human half. It’s good. The art’s an incredible problem, but the story’s good. I had wondered what was wrong with Gerber on the previous story, but he’s got it here.

The middle story is the Bram Stoker adaptation, and it’s a good argument Dick Giordano’s career should’ve been spent illustrating journals with accurate scenery. This portion of the adaptation is Mina and Lucy still at Lucy’s mom’s house, no suitors around, just Lucy sleepwalking around the English countryside. In Bram Stoker’s Dracula, it’s when werewolf Dracula assaults Lucy. Only there’s a whole thing about there being a stone chair and gravestone, and it’s the girls’ favorite spot, and it’s lovely. Gorgeous art from Giordano eighty-five percent of the time. It’s a delight.

It’s also where writer Roy Thomas (and, obviously, Giordano) get to do some adapting. Because they’re not doing werewolf Dracula, they’re doing (close to) Tomb of Dracula Dracula, and it adds some very interesting layers to the adaptation. Presumably. Dracula is just around this issue in the background.

I’m positive I read this adaptation (Marvel finished it in the aughts), but I don’t remember it being so impressive. Probably my bad (or it falls apart).

Then there’s a two-pager from Doug Moench and Win Mortimer, done sort of in a fifties horror style. Some European city’s problems with vampires over the years. It’s solid, with Moench finding a good tone for the exposition.

The first story is also Moench; he and artist Tony DeZuniga finish their “husbands vs. Dracula” story, which started in the last issue. Dracula has just thrown some widower into a pit—possibly the pit from Tomb, but also possibly not—and the guy quickly discovers it’s where Drac’s been keeping his latest vampire brides.

Including the hero’s wife.

What follows is horror action, with the hero coming up with a scheme to avenge himself while also saving the town or something. He also has a plan to save his wife’s eternal soul, which seems to be entirely in his head and the dialogue because Moench goes nowhere with that aspect (souls). The exposition’s a little overwritten, but who cares, the DeZuniga art is gorgeous. Great Gothic good girl art, fantastic horror trappings.

The finale’s a little bit of a miss, especially given the build-up, but it all works out. Especially since the comic goes uphill as it continues, with the Lilith finish graded on a different, Bob Brown-related scale, of course.

Dracula Lives (1973) #10

Dl10

The secret to Doug Moench on Dracula Lives is the art. Tony DeZuñiga does a great, sometimes sketchy, always emotive style for their story this issue, and it’s fantastic. The art’s moody enough to sell Moench’s more turgid exposition.

They’re on the first story, which takes place in 1809 Transylvania, though the outfits and mannerisms make me wonder if DeZuñiga thought it was 1909, and they moved it back after the art was done. The vampire living in the big scary castle on the mountain keeps killing the town’s wives and daughters, but the mayor and police chief don’t want to hear about it.

One angry husband decides he will not let Dracula have his wife and fights back, with multiple terrible consequences and an excellent cliffhanger. Such good art. So, so good. I’d been impressed with DeZuñiga’s last work on Lives, but this one’s even better. Lots of range.

The magazine continues to suffer format adjustments—less funny text pieces, a letters page—but Gary Gerani’s Dracula A.D. 1972 review fits the Lives review pattern. Gerani gives a lengthy recap of the Hammer Dracula movies, mentioning the one or two he thinks are good, then does a very brief, disappointed review of the subject sequel. It’s a lot of filler for anyone reading Lives regularly.

Then comes the next part of the Bram Stoker adaptation by Roy Thomas and Dick Giordano. Giordano excels at drawing Victorian Good Girl art but can’t manage to draw a dog close-up. It’s an outlier panel in an otherwise gorgeous entry.

The action has moved to England, where Mina is writing in a new journal all about how much she misses her fiancé, Jonathan Harker, and why doesn’t he write more. She’s staying with her newly engaged friend Lucy, who’s taken to sleepwalking. It’s standard Dracula adaptation fare, but Giordano’s enthusiastic, and the chapter’s the first to really engage with the novel’s epistolary style. First Mina’s journal, then a newspaper report about the ship crashing. It’s one of the most successful entries, even if the source novel’s prose ain’t great.

The following story is a tedious sixteen-page story from Steve Gerber, Bob Brown, and “Crusty Bunkers.” It’s not a Dracula story; it’s a Lilith, Daughter of Dracula, story. My bad for reading things out of order, but at least this way, I know I don’t want to backtrack and read Vampire Tales for Gerber’s Lilith stories. Lilith is a Marvel attempt at a sexy female vampire who lusts for male blood. It’s very awkward wish fulfillment.

Lilith’s a good guy, though, beating up Mongols who interrupt Village hippies’ acoustic sets. This story has her getting involved in the problems of her human host’s boyfriend. He’s been framed; it’s up to Lilith to save the day. Or night, as it were.

Gerber writes a lot. A lot. Some of the action is good, but the endless exposition and Lilith’s tepid characterization are big minuses. Then there’s the art. Brown clearly needs a strong inker, and even though the Bunkers were Neal Adams, Bob McLeod, Terry Austin, and Russ Heath, apparently their Voltron combination was not what the art needed. As a result, it feels amateurish at times.

Not a strong finish to an outstanding issue—the best in a while, but also the most accomplished.

Though it does remind me to read Giant-Size Chillers in-line with my Tomb of Dracula read-through.

I also forgot the two-page finale: uncredited Moench script, uncredited Win Mortimer art. It’s in the style of a fifties horror quickie but way too overwritten by Moench. They obviously should’ve gotten DeZuñiga to even him out.

Dracula Lives (1973) #9

Dl9

Until the last story, which might be the least impressive entry in an issue of unimpressive entries… I think the most successful art, overall, in the issue is Ernie Chan’s one-pager. It opens the issue, with a Tony Isabella script, all about the various ways of killing vampires. It’s amusing and practical; statements it’s difficult to make about the rest of the issue.

The first story’s the most disappointing, just because it continues Doug Moench’s okay “Dracula vs. the NYPD” story from the previous issue. This time Frank Robbins is penciling with Frank Springer inking. It’s a cartoony style, with disappointing character work. Not sure if it’s Robbins or Springer, but the people look lousy. Neither good nor bad is Dracula, who’s more inhuman. The story involves Dracula tracking down the guy who looted his castle and having to figure out how to get his wares back.

Meanwhile, the cop whose wife Dracula killed last issue is out to get him. His fellow cops believe his story of a vampire forcing the guy to kill his own wife, which tracks. Imagine what police accountability was like in the seventies.

Interestingly, Dracula’s still a somewhat mythic figure, with the lady who buys his stuff at auction (seriously, hasn’t another Tomb story used this bit) wishing he were real. Well, she finds out.

For a panel, it seems like the Franks are at least enthusiastic about good girl art but then not really.

The disappointing art sets the tone for the rest of the issue, with the most personally disappointing coming up next. It’s another Moench story (there are four features, one movie review, and a letters page, yet another change of regular content), with art by twenty-one-year-old Paul Gulacy and inks by Mike Esposito. It’s about Dracula versus some other vampire; this other vampire’s terrorizing a European village, which pisses Dracula off because it means no easy feeding there.

I’d love to say baby Paul Gulacy has the chops.

He does not. He’s got better panels and worse panels, and you can see proto-Gulacy at work (even the almond eyes), but you can’t really see how good he’ll get from this one.

The story’s got a strange finish, kind of jokey. What’s more bizarre is the other two stories have the same kind of finish.

They have a different writer, though—Gerry Conway.

His first story has Alfredo Alcala art. Alcala’s a better inker than penciller and inker. His faces are flat in the wrong places, and his figures are strange. His backgrounds are fantastic. The story’s about a young couple; the evil girl convinces the boy to rob a jewelry store for her.

Meanwhile, Dracula’s around. Their paths cross. Unlike the Moench story, this one begins and ends with light humor. It’s a weird tone, especially with the art. The whole issue just feels off.

The last story—the only one where the art’s more successful than that Chan one-pager—is about a mysterious figure in a top hat hunting Dracula. Sonny Trinidad does the art. The art’s good. The story’s terrible. Conway takes a big swing with it and completely misses. So again, the issue feels off, especially with usually sturdy (on Lives anyway) Conway fumbling both his stories. Moench’s got more art problems, so it’s hard to say. But Conway’s stories go wrong because of the writing.

The movie review—by Gerry Boudreau—covers the Hammer Dracula film, The Scars of Dracula. Boudreau hates it, though with less personality than Moench or Isabella had in their previous reviews.

No Bram Stoker’s Dracula adaptation here.

Unfortunately—and unexpectedly—I’m back to wondering if Lives is worth it again.