Jim Trombetta

Author Jim Trombetta's massive 312-page, over-sized book (published by Abrams) provides a superb pictorial overview of one of comics’ greatest and artistically brilliant periods, but at the same time one of the most controversial periods in the history of the comic book medium. The American horror comics of the 1950's were a mass of sublimintated cultural neurosis and subconscious fear all played out in the guise of short form comic strip horror anthologies. Trombetta contextualises these comics and places them squarely as a product of their time and culture. He provides an excellent history, alongside creator overviews and breaks down the book into the various sub-genres that dominated the horror comics – ranging from nuclear terror; crime and brainwashing through to skeletons; vampires and werewolves. Trombetta’s approach is scholarly, intellectual and Freudian. On occasion, however, it tips over into the overly academic and pretentious. What exactly, for example, does the following mean: "Skeletons perform any number of lonely personal revenges, but they most often appear less as the mirror of human self-hatred than as a quorum." Perhaps the above is being overly critical as Trombetta’s prose is for the most part highly readable and highly intelligent. The book is also full of page after page of full-colour cover reproductions in all their grisly glory and 16 stories are presented in full – my favourite possibly being the story “Inheritance” from “The Thing” issue 14, published by Charlton comics in June 1954, mainly because it features the strange art of the magical Steve Ditko. Other featured artists include Reed Crandall, Al Feldstein, Frank Kelly Freas, Marie Severin, Wally Wood, Russ Heath, Graham Ingels, Alex Toth, Jack Davis and the incomparable Basil Wolverton. It is also good to see that the book doesn’t simply focus on the EC Comics. Whereas EC were without doubt the “crème-de-la-crème” of the horror comics, they only accounted for around 3% of the entire horror comics output. It was therefore good to see some of the lesser known comics and publishing houses given some long overdue recognition. The book comes with a DVD entitled "Confidential File," which is a 25-minute TV show from 1955, about the “evils” of comic books and their effects on juvenile delinquency. The book also has an introduction by celebrated children's author R. L. Stine who describes his experiences as a youngster buying horror comics during that 1950’s “Golden Age” of horror comics. “The Horror! The Horror!” is an excellently put together book and authoritative study into one of the most powerful and fascinating periods of comics history.… (mehr)